<p><br /> 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.<br /> </p><p><br /> "We committed no crime. We are not spies," Sarah Shourd told reporters.<br /> </p><p><br /> 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."<br /> </p><p><br /> She thanked the government and religious leaders of Iran for her release and called the incident "a huge misunderstanding."<br /> </p><p><br /> Shourd was detained near the Islamic Republic's border with Iraq in July 2009 along with two male companions, Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal.<br /> </p><p><br /> 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.<br /> </p><p><br /> "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.<br /> </p>
