Freed German reporters arrive home

Two German reporters detained in Iran for four months after interviewing the son and lawyer of a woman facing death by stoning arrived home Sunday after being fined and freed, the foreign ministry said.

"I am very happy that Marcus Hellwig and Jens Koch are finally able to return to us in Germany as free people," Chancellor Angela Merkel told the Bild am Sonntag, the newspaper for which the two men work.

Koch's father, Andreas Hartmann, said he was overjoyed by the end of the reporters' four-month imprisonment, which had strained relations between Berlin and Tehran.

"I think I did not say anything on the telephone; I just listened and cried uncontrollably," he said in remarks also printed in Bild.

Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle traveled to Iran personally to retrieve the journalists, in the first trip of the top German diplomat to the country since Joschka Fischer visited in October 2003.

During his brief stay, Westerwelle met with his counterpart, Ali Akbar Salehi, and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

AFP