Following almost two years of detainment, UC Berkeley alumni Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer will receive their verdict from Iran’s Revolutionary Court within one week following their trial Sunday.
In the days leading up to the trial, local groups have been increasing efforts to advocate for the hikers’ release.
Fattal and Bauer’s hearing was delayed in May without any given explanation from Iranian authorities. Both are facing charges of illegally entering Iran and espionage, to which they have pleaded not guilty.
In 2009, Bauer, Fattal and Bauer’s fiance, Sarah Shourd, were arrested by Iranian officials for allegedly spying while hiking along the Iran-Iraq border.
Shourd said in a lecture at UC Berkeley in June that the three were hiking in the Kurdistan province of Iraq — an area frequented by tourists — when an Iranian soldier saw them and gestured for them to step off of their hiking trail. He then pointed to the trail and said “Iraq” and pointed to the spot where they now stood and said “Iran,” indicating that they had unknowingly crossed the border.
After discovering a lump in her breast, Shourd was released on $500,000 bail in September 2010.
In Berkeley, students and community members have been increasing advocacy efforts as the day of the trial approaches.
On campus, the ASUC has been trying to garner student support for Fattal and Bauer’s release, according to Joey Freeman, ASUC External Affairs Vice President.
Freeman said he urges students to support the hikers’ safe return by joining the advocacy campaign called One Million Voices for Shane and Josh, which encourages supporters to send 1 million calls to the Interests Section of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Washington, D.C.
The campaign for One Million Voices for Shane and Josh started Monday, said Kristina Lim, an organizer for the Bay Area support group for Bauer and Fattal’s release — which includes this call-in campaign. She said the group aims to achieve the one million calls “to show a steady stream of support for the upcoming trial.”
“I strongly support the One Million Voices for Shane and Josh campaign and have encouraged students at Berkeley to participate,” Freeman said. “We have been asking the community to call every day this week to send a powerful message that we stand with Shane and Josh.”
Freeman said that he and members of the ASUC are hoping for the safe return of the detained hikers to the United States.
“Shane and Josh are part of the Cal family, and I strongly feel that it is my responsibility to urge students to let the powers that be know that Shane and Josh belong at home with their families,” he said.
In Berkeley, City Councilmember Gordon Wozniak, who said his son is acquaintances with Fattal and Bauer, called on citizens of Berkeley to join in the advocacy efforts.
“We need to keep their cause alive by applying public pressure,” Wozniak said. “We need to call public attention so they don’t get lost and forgotten.”
According to Lim, advocates for the hikers’ release have tried many methods of garnering public attention, including holding vigils, street theaters and photo exhibits. On Friday, family and friends of Bauer and Fattal held a rally outside of Iran’s Mission to the United Nations in New York.
The rally, as well as ongoing advocacy efforts, “will show a huge shift of support so that Iran will see that this is a humanitarian issue and there is a lot of pressure from the whole wide community to release them,” Lim said.
At the New York Rally, Shane Bauer’s father, Al Bauer, Shourd and Josh Fattal’s mother, Laura Fattal, were among the few who addressed the gathering, according to a statement from the Free the Hikers organization.
“If there is fairness in Iran’s legal system, their release is close at hand,” Al Bauer said in the statement. “I ask everyone here to pray for the next 36 hours until Shane and Josh walk into that courtroom, so that when they walk out they are finally free men and can begin their journey back into our arms.”
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“Detained UC hikers to receive verdict within one week”
Well, more than a week has passed. What’s the verdict?
I think these young Americans are idiots.
I think it is obvious to anyone looking at the situation objectively that these people were almost certainly engaged in illicit activity – most likely aiding the student rebellions in Iran.
I think that no matter what their real motives were, they have spent an adequate amount of time in prison and in fear for their lives that it is high time they were released.
I know josh personally from building trail with him. He is very peaceful and was traveling to a waterfall when the iranian guard called them to come over. He should be freed as should all political prisoners. Makes you wonder how many people the United States is holding illegally.
[I know josh personally from building trail with him. He is very peaceful
and was traveling to a waterfall when the iranian guard called them to
come over. He should be freed as should all political prisoners. Makes
you wonder how many people the United States is holding illegally.]
Sorry, you sound as out to lunch as Josh. Do yourself and your parents a favor, and limit your hiking to Tilden Park…
Peace and conflict studies should include a mandatory course in common sense
[Peace and conflict studies should include a mandatory course in common sense]
According to former classmate who made the mistake of taking PACS during his first semester, that would sort of negate the entire premise of the program to begin with…
It is terrible to look at these two guys awaiting for what could be a guilty verdict and to know that that will mean their death. On the other hand, it is indescribably odd when you wonder what were these two men thinking when they decided to hike around two countries where Americans are hated to death by extremist groups? Wanna talk about lacking any sense of prudence?
It is terrible to look at these two guys awaiting for what could be a guilty verdict and to know that that will mean their death. On the other hand, it is indescribably shocking to wonder what were these two men thinking when they decided to hike around two countries where Americans are hated to death by extremist groups? Wanna talk about lacking any sense of prudence?
Except that they were hiking in an area frequented by tourists and recommended to them as safe, an area where BBC reporters have taken vacations (http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/pm/2010/09/holiday_2011.shtml). Their decision to hike farther and farther without knowing where the Iranian border was MAY be a case of imprudence, although that would depend on what they had been led to believe regarding the area and the likelihood of encountering the border. Generally, when I go hiking in a tourist location, I don’t expect that some unmarked bit of ground will turn out to have been a national border.
[Their decision to hike farther and farther without knowing where the Iranian border was MAY be a case of imprudence]
That’s putting it lightly. It’s plain stupidity. I lived and worked in Israel for some time, and while driving and hiking around the country, I made it a point to know where I was, and where the borders with Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, the West Bank, Egypt, and Gaza Strip were located. And in all honesty, most of the Israeli border areas are far better marked than the border of Iran and Iraq. If you think ignorance of your situation is some type of excuse in third-world countries, you are seriously deluded.
Send them a couple of tankers full of Mexicans and see if they fall all over themselves to give these wonderful people their country.
Anyone caught hiking on the border between two stank ass countries like Iraq and Iran, deserve to be imprisoned. Fucking idiots.
Oh, nice. Yes, let’s fall all over ourselves to blame some victims.
You must be a real laugh riot at a rape scene.
Maybe it’s just me, but having served 6 years in the armed forces (US Air Force, in particular) and having traveled overseas extensively before going back to school and being accepted to Cal, I learned a long time ago about something called SITUATIONAL AWARENESS. Whether we’re talking Mexico, Northern Ireland, the Balkans, Israel, or other places in the middle east, you don’t go traipsing around the world unless you have a damn good idea where you are, and what the local score is. Unfortunately, Cal and other universities full of liberal-progressive do-gooder types are more concerned with their little Utopian interpretation of how the world works than dealing with reality. The fact of the matter is that these clueless children (yes, children) got themselves into their predicament thanks to their own ignorance and disregard for common sense. Whose fault is that again?
Ahem. They were hiking near a popular–I repeat, popular–tourist location. While hiking, they reportedly crossed a (totally unmarked) part of the border.
Does their ignorance of the border’s location make them guilty of lacking “situational awareness”? Maybe. It would depend on details about their situation which simply aren’t known with certainty. Did the locals assure them that the area was safe? Did they cross the border only after Iranian soldiers motioned for them to approach? (http://www.registerguard.com/web/opinion/26650021-47/iran-hikers-bauer-fattal-iranian.html.csp) For that matter, were the Iranian soldiers simply lying about them having crossed the border?
[Ahem. They were hiking near a popular--I repeat, popular--tourist
location. While hiking, they reportedly crossed a (totally unmarked)
part of the border.]
Word up to young ones. Most borders in third world countries don’t necessarily have fences and signs indicating the location of the border. In fact, they don’t even have those nice dotted lines you see on the maps or in the old Bugs Bunny cartoons. If you’re willing to travel off to some trouble spot in the world, at least have the common sense to do a bit of research as to where exactly you are going.
It’s quite clear that Cal is full of sheltered children who thing their parent’s money and middle-class upbringing provides magical protection when traipsing of to all corners of the planet. Anyone wandering near a disputed border or trouble area should damn well know where the border is or bring a map so they know where in the hell they are. No excuse for ignorance…