An American woman released last week after being held in Iran with two friends for over a year on suspicion of spying said they were innocent hikers who never intended to cross into Iran from Iraq.
"We committed no crime. We are not spies," Sarah Shourd told reporters.
Shourd, 32, said they "had no knowledge of our proximity to the Iran-Iraq border" when they went hiking near a popular waterfall tourist site, saying any such border "was entirely unmarked and indistinguishable."
She thanked the government and religious leaders of Iran for her release and called the incident "a huge misunderstanding."
Shourd was detained near the Islamic Republic's border with Iraq in July 2009 along with two male companions, Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called on the United States to release eight Iranians, noting that his country had made a humanitarian gesture in releasing Shourd.
"I believe that it would not be misplaced to ask that the US government... to release the Iranians who were illegally arrested and detained here in the United States," Ahmadinejad said.
