With Muhammad Ali at their side, the mothers of hikers Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer on Tuesday called upon Iran to release their sons after 22 months in captivity. Under a banner with the words "662 Days Without Freedom," Laura Fattal and Bauer's mother, Cindy Hickey, stood with the boxing icon and American Muslim leaders to stress the pair's innocence. They face trial on charges of entering Iran illegally for espionage.Their plight brought Ali to Washington from his home in Arizona. With his speech impeded by Parkinson's disease, his wife, Lonnie, spoke for him. The hikers reminded her husband of himself as a young man, "a citizen of the world" with a thirst for knowledge of other cultures, she said.
"After reading about Shane and Josh, he felt . . . these were two young men - who regardless of what international policy says, regardless of what politics says - wanted to experience the world, wanted to experience other cultures, wanted to experience other people," she said. ". . . That's a good thing."
On Tuesday, an official from the Iranian Foreign Ministry said that calling the pair "hikers" was a "joke," and suggested their prosecution would proceed. Laura Fattal said, "Iran's indecision and delay have taken a terrible toll - on them and on us."
On Sunday, the two were allowed five-minute phone calls home - for the first time since Nov. 27, and third since their arrest. Josh Fattal told his father he was "honored" Ali had taken up his cause.
The Islamic representatives who joined the mothers - from the Islamic Society of North America, the Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation, the Universal Muslim Association of America, and the Council on American Islamic Relations - sent a letter to Iran's Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei pleading for "compassion and mercy."
"After listening to the families, we believe that these Americans did not seek to cause any problems between the United States and the Muslim world . . . but were in the region for the opposite purpose, to promote dialogue and understanding," they wrote.