“These kids are innocent and Iran knows it,” Laura Fattal, mother of captive Josh Fattal, told The Associated Press. The mothers say Iranian officials are flouting their country’s humanitarian and legal obligations by holding the three Americans without a trial.
Josh Fattal, 28, Sarah Shourd, 31, and Shane Bauer, 27, were arrested along the Iran-Iraq border, and Iranian officials have accused them of espionage. Their families say the three were hiking in Iraq’s northern Kurdistan and that any border crossing was unintentional.
“We’re no longer asking, we’re demanding,” said Shourd, of Oakland, Calif. “They got their compassionate little propaganda piece out of our visit, and we got nothing out of it. Whatever we have to do at this point to publicly embarrass and put them in a corner, we’ll do.”