Iran Charges 3 U.S. Citizens with Spying

The general prosecutor in Tehran has confirmed that three U.S. citizens arrested near Iran's border with Iraq in July have been charged with espionage.

Shane Bauer, 27, Sarah Shourd, 31, and Josh Fattal, 27, three graduates of the University of California, Berkeley, were detained on July 31 after they strayed in to Iranian territory whilst hiking in Northern Iraq. The Guardian reports that the area in which the three were hiking is a mountainous area between the Kurdish regions of Iran and Iraq, and has a border that is poorly marked. As fears grow that the trio may find themselves being used by the Iranian authorities to extract concessions from the West, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad suggested in September that they could indeed be used to help secure the release of Iranian diplomats supposedly being held by U.S. troops in Iraq, Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi, the general prosecutor in Tehran, has indicated that charges of espionage have been laid. President Ahmadinejad apparently also said that the case of the hikers should be looked at with "maximum leniency". Noting that it is not clear if the charges referred to are formal as such the New York Post quotes Mr Dolatabadi as saying, the Iranian state news agency IRNA is the source, that investigations are ongoing and an "opinion (on their case) will be given in the not distant future". Both the U.S. government and the hikers' families have asserted that the crossing of the Iranian border had been purely accidental and, speaking from Berlin, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said:

We believe strongly that there is no evidence to support any charge whatsoever. We would renew our request on behalf of these three young people and their families that the Iranian government exercise compassion and release them so they can return home, and we will continue to make that case

U.S. interests in Iran are represented by Switzerland and according to the Voice of America Swiss diplomats have paid two visits to Tehran's Evin prison to talk with the three American citizens, who are said in a statement released by their families to be in good physical shape. Following the first visit in September the diplomats returned to the prison last Thursday. In addition to mentioning the case of Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi, charged with espionage by the Iranian authorities in April and then released from jail in May, the New York Post reports on how U.S. academic Kian Tajbakhsh received a 12-year jail sentence in October for his alleged involvement in the post-election protests in Iran. Newsweek reporter Maziar Bahari, a Canadian-Iranian, was another person put on trial for allegedly taking part in some way in the protests. Mr Bahari was eventually released on bail last month and subsequently left Iran.