Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Tuesday that he intends to release two Americans who have been jailed on charges of espionage for two years and grant them a “unilateral pardon.” 
 
 “I am helping to arrange for their release in a couple of days so they will be able to return home,” Ahmadinejad told The Washington Post in an hour-long interview at his office here. 
 
 The Americans, Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal, both 29, were arrested along with another American, Sarah Shourd, as they hiked along the Iran-Iraq border in July 2009. Last month, Bauer and Fattal were sentenced to eight years in prison. 
 
 Shourd was released in September 2010 on medical and humanitarian grounds after posting $500,000 bail. 
 
 In Washington, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said she was “encouraged” by Ahmadinejad’s comments. There was no immediate reaction from the families of Bauer or Fattal. 
 
 The promise to free the hikers could eliminate a key flash point in relations between Iran and the United States, although many more remain. It comes just weeks before Ahmadinejad is due to visit New York for the annual U.N. General Assembly meeting, and it coincides with other conciliatory actions by Iran, including a letter to European Union officials offering new talks on Iran’s nuclear program. 
 
 It was not clear, however, whether Iran’s diplomatic outreach included the kinds of concessions that Western officials say would be necessary to resume talks that broke down in January. 
 
 In the interview Tuesday, Ahmadinejad suggested he was open to a resolution of the standoff over the country’s uranium-enrichment program, although apparent deals have fallen apart in the past. 
 
 $500,000 bail demanded 
 
 Masoud Shafiei, a lawyer representing the hikers, said he had been told by court officials that each of them would have to pay $500,000 in bail, as Shourd had to do. He said the bond was being demanded because, even though Bauer and Fattal have been convicted, their case is open to appeal and a final verdict has not been rendered. 
 
 “Basically if they don’t pay their bail, they won’t be freed,” Shafiei said. “I don’t know who arranged this, the court or the president. The judiciary has said that everything is being done according to their procedures.” 
 
 Ahmadinejad said Bauer and Fattal will be “free to choose” how they return to the United States. Ahmadinejad’s decision to pardon the men is subject to review by Iran’s clerical authorities. 
 
 Bauer, Fattal and Shourd were hiking in the mountains of Iraq’s northern Kurdish region on July 31, 2009, when, according to their families, they strayed across the border by accident. Authorities in Tehran confirmed three days later that the three had been arrested, and an Iranian Arabic-language television network quoted police sources as saying the hikers were “CIA agents.” 
 
 Bauer and Shourd were free-lance journalists who were living together in Damascus, Syria, where Shourd also taught English and was studying Arabic, friends and relatives said. Fattal is a friend of Bauer’s who was visiting the Middle East to explore his father’s roots in Iraq. All three graduated from the University of California at Berkeley. 
 
 Bauer, an Arabic speaker from Minnesota who graduated from Berkeley in 2007 with a degree in Arabic and peace and conflict studies, was a Middle East correspondent for New America Media and has written for publications including the Nation magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Los Angeles Times and Slate.com. Shourd has written for Brave New Traveler, an online travel magazine. At the time of her arrest, she had identified herself on the magazine’s Web site as a “teacher-activist-writer from California currently based in the Middle East.” 
 
 In May 2010, the three Americans’ mothers were allowed to meet with their children in Tehran for the first time since their arrest. The hikers had complained to diplomats about isolation and depression while being held in Evin prison. 
 
 But Iran’s intelligence minister, Heidar Moslehi, reiterated his accusations during the visit that the three hikers were on an espionage mission. And he repeated demands for the release of Iranians allegedly abducted by the United States. 
 
 Call for elections in Syria 
 
 Ahmadinejad parried questions Tuesday about Iran’s ties with the embattled government in Syria, a key ally. 
 
 Ahmadinejad called for free elections in Syria and suggested that President Bashar al-Assad implement a reform program, although he was vague about the type of reforms he recommended. 
 
 He said Iran’s economy was flourishing, in contrast to the economies of the United States and Western powers that have led efforts to penalize Iran for its uranium-enrichment program. “Those who imposed sanctions on us are now facing economic recession,” he said. “They have created problems for themselves because we have a large economy.” 
 
 Ahmadinejad brushed off reports of a serious rift between him and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme religious and political authority in the Islamic republic. “Can you find two people in the world who are the same?” he said in response to a question about the split, which surfaced this year when Ahmadinejad attempted to dismiss his intelligence minister, only to be overruled by Khamenei. 
 
 The president also shrugged off attacks on a key aide and confidant, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, who has been heavily criticized by hard-line conservatives and clerics loyal to Khamenei. 
 
 “I do not expect all to like my colleagues,” Ahmadinejad said. 
 
 Correspondent Thomas Erdbrink in Tehran and staff writers William Branigin and Joby Warrick in Washington contributed to this report. ||||| Two American hikers jailed in Iran since 2009 were freed from prison Wednesday and flown to Oman, where they were reunited with joyful family members. 
 
 Shane Bauer and Joshua Fattal, both 29, were released Wednesday evening local time after spending more than two years in prison on charges of illegal entry and espionage since they and a companion, Sarah Shourd, were arrested on the border between Iraq and Iran while hiking in the mountainous region. Shourd, who was freed last year and is engaged to Bauer, was on hand in Oman to greet the two as they ran down the stairs from the private plane that picked them up in Iran and flew them to freedom. 
 
 “We’re so happy we are free,” Fattal told reporters at Muscat International Airport in Oman. 
 
 “Two years in prison is too long,” Bauer said. He expressed hope that Wednesday’s release would lead to “freedom for political prisoners in America and Iran.” After making their brief statements, Bauer and Fattal left the airport with their families. 
 
 The release came a day before Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was scheduled to address the U.N. General Assembly in New York, and it seemed timed at least in part as a goodwill gesture ahead of the speech. 
 
 “We are thrilled,” said President Obama, also in New York for the U.N. session, after being informed of the release. He told reporters it was a “wonderful day” for the two men’s families “and for us.” 
 
 In a statement issued later by the White House, Obama praised “the tireless advocacy” of the families. He also expressed gratitude to Oman’s Sultan Qaboos bin Said, the ruler of the tiny monarchy on the Arabian Peninsula, and to Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, the Swiss government and others around the world “who have worked steadfastly over the past two years to secure the release of Shane and Josh.” 
 
 A convoy of official cars left Tehran’s notorious Evin prison about 6:30 p.m. local time (10 a.m. in Washington), the government-controlled Islamic Republic News Agency reported. 
 
 The plane carrying the hikers left Tehran’s Mehrabad Airport and arrived in Oman about 3:40 p.m. Washington time. 
 
 The two men raced down the aircraft’s stairs to embrace family members waiting on the tarmac, television images showed. 
 
 Both men were surrounded by journalists and U.S. Embassy officials, as Bauer hugged Shourd, who was released from Evin prison in September 2010 on medical grounds. 
 
 “Today can only be described as the best day of our lives,” the family members said in a joint statement reported by the Associated Press. “We have waited for nearly 26 months for this moment,” it added. “We now all want nothing more than to wrap Shane and Josh in our arms, catch up on two lost years and make a new beginning, for them and for all of us.” 
 
 Masoud Shafiei, an Iranian lawyer representing Bauer and Fattal, spent two hours inside the prison complex earlier in the day completing paperwork for the Americans’ release. He told the semiofficial Iranian Students News Agency that the government of Oman had paid $1 million bail for Bauer and Fattal. Oman also reportedly paid bail last year to secure the release of Shourd. 
 
 After signing the papers, Shafiei waited outside the prison with the Swiss ambassador to Iran, Livia Leu Agosti, who represents U.S. interests in the country because Washington and Tehran do not have diplomatic relations. 
 
 When two Iranian government cars left the prison complex, presumably with the Americans inside, Shafiei and Agosti sped after them. 
 
 Bauer and Fattal were convicted of espionage charges in a closed trial last month. They denied being spies, maintaining that if they crossed the Iranian border, they did so accidentally while hiking with Shourd. 
 
 Ahmadinejad told journalists from The Washington Post and NBC News last week that Bauer and Fattal would receive a “unilateral pardon” and would be home “within days.” 
 
 The next day, Iran’s judiciary, which is led by Shiite Muslim clerics who once supported Ahmadinejad but now oppose him, reacted angrily, stressing that Ahmadinejad did not have the authority to free the men. 
 
 On Sunday, the men’s release was delayed again because one of the judges whose signature is required on the bail paperwork was on vacation. Shafiei said that he had received the second signature Wednesday morning. 
 
 The controversy over the hikers was the dominant backdrop as Ahmadinejad headed to New York on Monday to participate in the annual U.N. General Assembly session. 
 
 News of the release was welcomed Wednesday by officials from the Council on American-Islamic Relations, who were part of a delegation of U.S. religious leaders and American Muslims who traveled to Iran to ask that the hikers be allowed to leave. 
 
 “We believe the efforts of the recent interfaith delegation to Iran offer a positive example of bridge-building initiatives that may be undertaken to help promote mutual understanding and cooperation between nations,” CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad said in a statement. “We hope our government will now address the issue of Iranian citizens detained in the United States with the same spirit of compassion.” 
 
 Staff writer William Branigin in Washington contributed to this report. ||||| Shane Bauer (2nd L), Sarah Shourd (3rd L) and Josh Fattal (2nd R) sit with their mothers during a news conference in Tehran May 20, 2010. 
 
 TEHRAN | 
 
 TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian authorities have delayed the trial of two Americans arrested near the Iraqi border in July 2009, a judiciary spokesman said on Monday, less than a week before they were due their first day in court. 
 
 Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal, who say they were hiking in northern Iraq and were not aware they had crossed into Iran, are at the center of a much bigger dispute between the United States and Tehran, which have been bitter foes since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. 
 
 Iran's judiciary spokesman said the trial could not go ahead as scheduled because of the absence of a third suspect, Sarah Shourd, who was arrested with the men but released on $500,000 bail in September this year and returned to the United States. 
 
 "Due to the absence of the third person, the court has delayed the trial time so that in between this time the third person can return to Iran or, in the event of her refusal to appear, her case be dealt with differently," Qolamhossein Mohseni-Ejei was quoted as saying by the semi-official Fars news agency. 
 
 Their lawyer said he was not aware the trial had been postponed. 
 
 "It is illogical. If they want to delay the trial, they should announce it in a notification to me or to Sarah Shourd, but they didn't," Masoud Shafiee told Reuters. 
 
 "So the trial should be held on Saturday then the judge will decide whether the trial will be delayed or not." 
 
 Shourd was released shortly before President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad attended the U.N. General Assembly in New York. He said letting her leave jail was a humanitarian gesture due to concerns about her health. She denied the spying charge. 
 
 SWAP 
 
 The trial delay comes as Washington and other powers are trying to prod Tehran to return to talks this month about its nuclear activities which they fear are aimed at making an atomic bomb. 
 
 Iran, which says its nuclear ambitions are peaceful, has said it is ready to restart the talks which stalled last year, but has yet to agree a date and has even suggested the talks should not address the nuclear issue. 
 
 Ahmadinejad suggested in February that the Americans might be released as part of a prisoner swap for Iranians he says have been abducted or tricked into going to the United States and jailed without due legal process. 
 
 One of those Iranians, a woman jailed for trafficking defense hardware to Iran, gave a telephone interview to Iran's state-run English language television channel on Monday in which she said she had been tortured. 
 
 "They took me to the prison and they started to torture me in every possible way, more especially, you know, mentally," Shahrazad Mir Gholikhan told Press TV. She did not give any further details of her ill-treatment. 
 
 Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said he hoped publicity about the case would help secure release of Iranian prisoners in U.S. jails. "Iran will pursue all channels regarding the matter," he was quoted by Fars news agency as saying. He did not mention the possibility of a prisoner swap.
– More than two years after they were jailed on charges of spying, American hikers Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal may finally be headed home. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad tells the Washington Post he will grant a “unilateral pardon” to the two men, and that he is working to arrange for their release and return home “in a couple of days.” Asked if it will definitely happen this week, the president replied, “I hope so.” Meanwhile, a defense attorney tells the AP that Iran set bail at $500,000 for each of the two men, and will free them once bail is paid. Bail was set at that amount for the third jailed hiker, Sarah Shourd, before her release last year. Last month, Bauer and Fattal were sentenced to eight years, a ruling their lawyer vowed to appeal.