Mother talks to hostage inside embassy

Press, 23 April 1980, Page 8

Mother talks to hostage inside embassy

■ NZPA-Reuter Teheran i j Barbara Timm spent 45 - minutes talking and holding r hands with her hostage son, . Kevin Hermening, at the oc- - cupied United States em- > bassy in Teheran yesterday, r and said afterwards he - seemed to be in excellent , physical and mental health. i Mrs Timm said her 20t year-old son, a Marines ser--1 geant at the embassy, had been surprised and overjoyed to see her. - He had been told only 20 1 minutes before she arrived ' at the embassy that she was ■ coming to see him. > “He was surprised and j overjoyed that I had travel1 led across the globe to be 4 with him. In those 45 min- ' utes, we never separated 1 hands,” Mrs Timm told a press conference. She was the first relative to be allowed to visit one of ; the hostages, who have seen only visiting clergymen, Iranian officials and doctors since militant students took them captive last November 4. Mrs Timm said they had spent most of the time exchanging news about Kevin’s family, sports, and conditions in the embassy. “Kevin told me he is now spending his days with several other hostages, reading and playing cards. He says he’s the best of the ginrummy players,” Mrs Timm said. She said the only condition the students had placed on the meeting, at which several students were present, was that she should not discuss political news at all. “I had the precondition that I should not discuss politics, and I said that was ! fine with me,” she said, add- j ing that the students had let j them talk freely and had at , no stage interrupted the con- ( versation. t Iranian Government of- ; ficials and the student mili- : tants holding the hostages in Teheran had agreed to allow ] more American families to < visit relatives among the j hostages, a spokesman for a < committee helping the fami- i lies said yesterday.