Freed American female hiker arrives in Muscat from Iran

Muscat: Sarah Shourd, the American hiker held on spying charges, arrived on Tuesday at the Muscat Airport by a special aircraft after being released on $500,000 bail by the Iranian authorities.

She was taken to an undisclosed destination. “We cannot say where in Oman she is staying or how long she will be in Oman,” a reliable source told Gulf News soon after Shourd was received by her mother Nora Shourd, her uncle and US ambassador to Oman, Richard Schmierer.

The source confirmed that Sarah arrived in Oman by a special flight. The bail for her freedom was paid at the Iranian state run Bank Melli’s Muscat branch located in the south MBD are in Ruwi. The source refused to divulge any more information about Sarah’s stay in Oman.

Shortly after announcing Shourd's release, Iranian authorities said they are not considering the immediate release of the two Americans arrested with Shourd — her fiance Shane Bauer and their friend Josh Fattal.

Iran has charged all three with spying, though their families say they were innocent hikers arrested in a scenic mountain area along Iran's border with Iraq.

"I want to really offer my thanks to everyone in the world, all of the governments, all of the people, that have been involved, and especially, particularly want to address President Ahmadinejad and all of the Iranian officials, the religious leaders, and thank them for this humanitarian gesture," Shourd told Iran's English-language Press TV at the airport before she boarded her flight out.

"I'm grateful and I'm very humbled by this moment," she added.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said Shourd was being released on compassionate grounds because of health reasons. Her mother says she has serious medical problems, including a breast lump and precancerous cervical cells.

President Barack Obama welcomed the release but the families of the three Americans had mixed emotions. He said all Americans are celebrating Shourd's long-awaited return home. "I am very pleased that Sarah Shourd has been released by the Iranian government, and will soon be united with her family," Obama said in a statement

Shourd's mother Nora said she has hoped and prayed for this moment for 410 days.

"I cannot wait to wrap Sarah in my arms and hold her close when we are finally together again. Sarah has had a long and difficult detainment and I am going to make sure that she now gets the care and attention she needs and the time and space to recover," she said. "I can only imagine how bittersweet her freedom must be for her, leaving Shane and Josh behind."

Both US officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

The release followed days of conflicting statements by Iranian authorities on whether she would be let go. The decision got mired in internal political feuds among Iran's leadership and questions over whether the family could raise the bail money and if it did, would the payment violate sanctions against Iran.

Shortly after Iranian state media announced Shourd's release, the country's hardline judiciary said the "pretrial detention" of Bauer and Fattal had been extended for two more months. Shourd and Bauer are engaged to be married.

Shourd, who grew up in Los Angeles, Bauer, who grew up in Onamia, Minn., and Fattal, who grew up in Elkins Park, Pa., were detained along the Iran-Iraq border on July 31, 2009 and accused of illegally crossing the border and spying in a case that has deepened tensions with Washington. Their families say they were hiking in Iraq's scenic north, and that if they crossed the border, they did so unwittingly.

The stage was set for Shourd's release last week when Ahmadinejad said he intervened as a gesture of Islamic compassion at the end of the holy month of Ramadan. However, the judiciary quickly upstaged the president by saying it was in charge of the case and would set the rules — in the form of the largest known bail for any high-profile Westerner jailed in the past year.

Shortly after judicial officials announced the bail on Sunday, Shourd's lawyer predicted she could walk free in "two or three days." Moves to release Shourd have been accompanied by political jockeying in Iran between Ahmadinejad and his more conservative rivals.

On Monday, Shourd's family asked the Iranians to drop or lower the demanded sum because they were having difficulty raising the money.