Journalist Roxana Saberi back in the U.S.
North Dakota Congressman Earl Pomeroy says an American journalist who spent four months in an Iranian prison has returned to the United States.
Roxana Saberi arrived at Washington Dulles International Airport Friday afternoon and will spend a few days in the capital before returning to her home state of North Dakota, Pomeroy said in a statement this afternoon.
Pomeroy said he was eager to welcome Saberi home.
Saberi, 32, had spent a week in Vienna recuperating after being released from prison in Iran.
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Saberi, who grew up in Fargo, N.D., and moved to Iran six years ago, has dual citizenship.
She was arrested in late January and convicted of spying for the United States in a closed-door trial that her Iranian-born father said lasted only 15 minutes.
She was freed May 11 after an appeals court reduced her sentence to two years suspended.
The United States had said the charges against Saberi were baseless and repeatedly demanded her release. The case against her had become an obstacle to President Barack Obama's attempts at dialogue with the top U.S. adversary in the Middle East.
Saberi had worked as a freelance journalist for several organizations, including National Public Radio and the British Broadcasting Corp.
After her arrest, Iranian authorities initially accused her of working without press credentials, but later leveled the far more serious charge of spying. Iran released few details about the allegations that she passed intelligence to the U.S.
(Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
