Iran to try American hikers

LONDON — As tensions build between Washington and Tehran, the Iranian foreign minister said Monday that three Americans arrested in July after crossing the border from northern Iraq would be tried but did not specify the charges, according to news reports.

The minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, told a news conference in Tehran that the three had “entered Iran with suspicious aims. The judiciary will try them.”

Reuters quoted him as saying “relevant sentences” would be handed down.

Read the rest here.

Sentences are being contemplated before the trial? If the name were not in the story, that line would have narrowed the list of potential countries quite a bit. On a side note; while I feel badly for the families of these people I am compelled to ask why Americans keep behaving like morons by hiking or sailing near the territory of unfriendly countries? This sort of thing happens far too frequently and the US Government is then put on the spot and expected to clean up the mess somehow.