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Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Tuesday proposed a swap of Iranians in U.S. prisons for three American hikers being held in Tehran.

Ahmadinejad said in an interview with state TV that negotiations were taking place about exchanging the hikers for several Iranians jailed for years in the United States.

“We are hopeful that all prisoners will be released,” he said.

These file photos released by freethehikers.org show, from left, Joshua Fattal, Shane Bauer and Sarah Shourd. The three were arrested in Iran last July. (freethehikers.org/Associated Press)

Ahmadinejad did not mention specifics but in December, Iran released a list of 11 Iranians it says are being held in the U.S. — including a nuclear scientist who disappeared in Saudi Arabia and a former Defence Ministry official who vanished in Turkey. The list also includes an Iranian arrested in Canada on charges of trying to obtain nuclear technology.

“I had said I would help in releasing them, but the attitude of some U.S. officials hurts the job,” Ahmadinejad said. “There are a large number of Iranians in prison in the U.S. They have abducted some of our citizens in other countries.”

Shane Bauer, Sarah Shourd and Josh Fattal were hiking in Iraq’s northern Kurdistan region in July when they accidentally crossed the border into Iran, their families have said.

Samantha Topping, a New York City-based spokeswoman for the three families, said they had no comment on Ahmadinejad’s remarks.

The White House, through a spokesman, called the reports “fragmentary.”

“If President Ahmadinejad’s comments suggest that they are prepared to resolve these cases, we would welcome that step,” National Security Council spokesman Mike Hammer said.

“But we have not entered into any discussion with Iran about an exchange. As we have indicated publicly, if Iran has questions about its citizens in U.S. custody, we are prepared to answer them.”

Iran’s foreign minister said in late December that the three would be tried in court, but he did not say when a trial would start or what the three would be charged with other than to say they had “suspicious aims.” Earlier, the country’s chief prosecutor said they were accused of spying.

Their families have said that’s ludicrous and last month hired an Iranian attorney to press the case.

Ahmadinejad said there were “indications they knew they were crossing into Iran.”

The last time anyone sympathetic saw the three was at the end of October, when Swiss diplomats were granted a small visit. The U.S. has no diplomatic relationship with Iran and is represented in such matters by the Swiss. At the time, the diplomats said the three were in excellent health.

When the list of 11 Iranians came out, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said it appeared the Iranian government was trying to suggest some kind of equivalence between the hikers and Iranians that had left Iran.

“There really is no equivalence at all,” he said at the time.

Three of the Iranians on the list have been convicted or charged in public court proceedings in the United States. The circumstances surrounding some of the others are more mysterious.

Ali Reza Asgari, a retired general in the elite Revolutionary Guard and a former deputy defence minister, disappeared while on a private trip to Turkey in December 2006.

Shahram Amiri, an Iranian nuclear scientist, went missing while on a pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia in June. Iran’s foreign minister has accused the U.S. of helping to kidnap him and has questioned for his return.

The list also includes three Iranians who Tehran claims were abducted in Europe and sent to the U.S.: merchant Mohsen Afrasiabi, who it says disappeared in Germany, as well as electrical engineering student Majid Kakavand and a former ambassador to Jordan, Nasrollah Tajik, who it says vanished in France.

One of the Iranians, Mahmoud Yadegari, was arrested in April in Canada after a joint investigation with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and charged with trying to send nuclear technology to his native Iran.

Authorities allege Yadegari tried to procure and export pressure transducers, which can be used in the production of enriched uranium but also have many legitimate commercial uses.

The plane dove into a house, killing all 49 people aboard and one man in the home in Buffalo on Feb. 12, 2009. (Associated Press)

Pilot error was the probable cause of an airline crash into a house near Buffalo, N.Y., last year, but the accident’s root problems extend far beyond a single event, a federal safety panel said Tuesday.

The head of the National Transportation Safety Board, Deborah Hersman, said the accident casts doubt on whether or not regional airlines are held to the same level of safety as are major airlines, and she promised the board will pursue the issue.

She also criticized the Federal Aviation Administration for taking too long to address safety problems raised by the crash, saying the same issues have turned up before.

“Today is Groundhog Day, and I feel like we are in that movie,” Hersman said, referring to the 1993 Bill Murray movie about a Pittsburgh weatherman who repeatedly lives through the same day.

“We have made recommendations time after time after time. They haven’t been heeded by the FAA.”

The FAA said in a statement that it has driven significant improvements in pilot professionalism, training and background checks in the past year. The agency said it will soon propose new rules to prevent pilot fatigue, further improve training and increase the qualifications required to be an airline pilot.

The three-member board agreed unanimously that an “inappropriate response” by the captain of Continental Connection Flight 3407 to a key piece of safety equipment caused the crash. The board also said an incorrect airspeed entered into the plane’s computers by the flight’s first officer and the air carrier’s inadequate procedures and training for entering airspeeds for freezing weather were contributing factors.

The board discussed issuing more than 20 safety recommendations as a result of the accident.

Hersman praised FAA Administrator Randy Babbitt for initiating regulation changes in response to the crash on Feb. 12, 2009, when the plane dove into a house, killing all 49 people aboard and one man in the house. But Hersman said Babbitt has been unable so far to push reforms “across the end line” and that congressional action may be needed.

Flight 3407, operated for Continental Airlines by Colgan Air Inc., was approaching Buffalo-Niagara International Airport when the twin-engine Bombardier turboprop experienced an aerodynamic stall and went into a dive. The board said Capt. Marvin Renslow should have been able to recover from the stall but that he did the opposite of what he should have done.

In the final seconds

In the final seconds of the flight, two pieces of safety equipment activated — a stick shaker to alert the crew their plane was nearing a stall and a stick pusher that points a plane’s nose down so it can recover speed, investigators said. The right response to both situations would have been to push forward on the control column to increase speed, they said.

But Renslow pulled back on the stick shaker, investigators said. When the plane stalled and the pusher activated, Renslow again pulled back three times.

“It wasn’t a split-second thing,” NTSB safety investigator Roger Cox said. “I reckon there was time to evaluate the situation and initiate a recovery, but I can’t give you a number of seconds.”

Seventy-five per cent of pilots who had experienced the stick-pusher activation in training also responded by pulling back instead of pushing forward, even though they knew ahead of time to expect a stall, investigators said.

The first officer, Rebecca Shaw, 24, should have stepped in to push the plane’s nose down herself when Renslow, 47, responded improperly, but she may not have because she was a relatively inexperienced pilot, investigators said.

Shaw commuted across the country overnight to Newark, N.J., to make Flight 3407. It’s not clear how much sleep either pilot received the night before the flight, but investigators said both pilots likely were suffering from fatigue.

Hersman wanted to list fatigue as a contributing factor to the crash. The board’s other two members declined, saying it couldn’t conclusively be determined if fatigue had impaired the pilots’ performance.

Shaw erred at the beginning of the flight by programming an ordinary airspeed into the plane’s computer, rather than the higher airspeed needed for freezing weather, investigators said. The plane didn’t accumulate enough ice on the wings to stall, but the mix-up on speeds caused the stick shaker to warn of a stall even though one wasn’t really imminent.

Renslow’s pull-back response, but, made a stall, the board said.

Both pilots violated rules against non-essential conversation during flight below 10,000 feet, which likely distracted them at a key moment, the board said.

Colgan’s pilot training program was also criticized for not giving Renslow remedial attention despite his failures on several tests of piloting skill and for not emphasizing procedures for recovering from a full stall, including how to respond to the stick pusher.

Colgan said in a statement that the pilots were properly trained in how to recover from a stall.

“We have taken a number of vital and specific steps to further enhance all of our training and hiring programs,” the statement said.

P.E.I. skip Kathy O’Rourke shares the lead with Ontario, each 5-1 before Draw 11 Tuesday night. (Nathan Denette/Canadian Press)

Ontario’s Krista McCarville went to 5-1 with an 8-5 victory over Newfoundland and Labrador’s Shelley Nichols as the Tournament of Hearts continued Tuesday in Sault Ste. Marie, Ont.

The win puts the Ontario rink in a first-place tie with P.E.I.’s Kathy O’Rourke.

The two leaders were to face each other in Draw 11 later Tuesday night at the Essar Centre.

Also in the afternoon draw, Team Canada’s Jennifer Jones beat B.C.’s Kelly Scott 10-7.

Meanwhile, Saskatchewan’s Amber Holland defeated Quebec’s Eve Belisle 8-6 as Manitoba’s Jill Thurston beat Alberta’s Valerie Sweeting 7-4.

In Draw 9 action earlier in the day, New Brunswick’s Andrea Kelly scored two in the 10th end to beat Northwest Territories/Yukon’s Sharon Cormier 9-7.

P.E.I. defeated Nova Scotia’s Nancy McConnery 7-4.

Also in the morning draw, B.C. beat Manitoba 7-5 and Canada beat Alberta 9-7.