Worth Every Penny

After more than a year of imprisonment in an Iranian jail, Sarah E. Shourd is finally able to come back to the United States. The young woman, along with two other American citizens, was captured in June 2009 by the Iranian police for illegally trespassing the Iranian border while on a supposed hike in the Iraqi mountains. Last week, the Iranian government decided to release the woman—who recently developed both a lump in her breast and precancerous cervical cells—upon the payment of a $500,000 bail. Despite the negative incentive—for others to demand high bails in exchange for prisoners—that might arise from accepting the deal proposed by the Iranian government, paying the bail was the right decision.

Getting a citizen back from a country that is holding her prisoner, especially when the detainee is in extremely poor health and runs the risk of becoming incurable, is worth $500,000. There is a worry that paying the bail will lead to a slippery slope, with the Iranian government asking more and more money in exchange for the release of other prisoners accused of all sorts of misconduct. This possibility might indeed become reality, but in the present circumstance it is worth allowing a seriously ill American citizen back to the United States. Naysayers must keep in mind that, in the future, steps can be taken in order to make a situation like the present one less likely to happen, and thus responding to the bail request in this instant is not necessarily a step toward perpetual payments to Iran.

Although we are glad Shourd is returning to the U.S., it is worth noticing that if the hikers were near the Iranian border, they behaved extremely irresponsibly as they completely disregarded the travel warning issued by the U.S. Bureau of Consular Affairs. According to the Bureau, people should avoid all but essential travel within Iraq; had the hikers been more cautious about their vacation destination, this regrettable situation would not have arisen.

It is also necessary to keep in mind that if the hikers did indeed cross the Iranian border, it was within the purview of the Iranian government to arrest them. The legitimacy of the hikers’ arrest, however, does not in any way justify the fact that the prisoners were detained for more than a year without a trial. The slow procedure of the Iranian judiciary system was wrong and should be condemned. Nevertheless, the appraisal of unidentified foreigners who crossed the Iranian border was legitimate, according to the laws of the country—and it is a practice that might lawfully be enforced again. In the future, travelers should be more careful.

Paying the bail for Shourd leaves, however, a very problematic issue on the table: the future of the other two hikers who are still held captive. As a condition of the money transfer, more information about the other two prisoners and about the prospects for their trial should be requested. In the best-case scenario, Shourd’s liberation might ease the release process of her companions. In the meantime, Shourd will be able to come back to the U.S., where she will receive all the treatments that she needs. After all, $500,000 is not too high a price for a life.