Iran sentences Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe to another year in jail

British-Iranian aid worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was sentenced to a further one-year jail term in Iran on Monday, drawing condemnation from Prime Minister Boris Johnson who said she should not be returned to prison.

"I don't think it's right at all that Nazanin should be sentenced to any more time in jail," Mr Johnson said following news that the 42-year-old mother had been convicted for a second time.

He added in a tweet that she must be allowed to return home.

The UK is working alongside the United States on the issue of dual-national jailed in the Islamic republic, he added.

Richard Ratcliffe, Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s husband, said the verdict was a surprise but that she had not yet been recalled to prison.

“We thought something would likely happen following last week's postponement, but it still was a bit of a surprise today,” he said.

He said he believed she was being held as a bargaining chip amid international negotiations to salvage the Iran nuclear deal.

“At a minimum they are buying themselves more time to hold onto Nazanin,” he said. “But we'll see what it means about the threat to return to prison.”

Mr Ratclife previously told The Telegraph that he believed his wife was being held hostage over the non-payment of a long-standing £400 million debt that London owes Tehran.

The UK has acknowledged it owes the debt – which arose over non-delivery of 1,500 Chieftain tanks ordered and paid for by the Shah of Iran shortly before his 1979 overthrow – but says repayment must not breach sanctions.

The latest sentence against Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe was handed down by a Revolutionary court for making propaganda against the Islamic republic, her lawyer Hojjat Kermani told the Emtedad news website, adding that the court banned her from leaving the country for a year.

The charges stemmed from accusations she attended a 2009 protest outside the Iranian embassy in London and had given an interview to BBC Persian, he said. The sentence would be appealed within 21 days, he added.

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab condemned the sentence, saying: “This is a totally inhumane and wholly unjustified decision.

“We continue to call on Iran to release Nazanin immediately so she can return to her family in the UK. We continue to do all we can to support her.”

Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who worked as a project manager for Thomson Reuters Foundation, was arrested at Tehran airport in April 2016 after visiting family in Iran.

She was sentenced to five years imprisonment for plotting to overthrow Iran’s clerical establishment. She spent four years in jail before being released on house arrest in Tehran in March 2020 as coronavirus spread through Iran’s prisons.

She completed her sentence on March 7 but faced a second trial on what Mr Raab called a second "arbitrary" set of charges.

Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s family and employer deny the charges against her.

“Our colleague is innocent,” said Thomson Reuters Foundation CEO Antonio Zappulla. “She has been incarcerated for a crime that she did not commit.”

Calling on the Government to challenge the sentence, Mr Zappulla said: “Nazanin’s ordeal should have ended on March 7, 2021. Instead, she continues to be held as a political hostage in Tehran, a victim of an international dispute.”

Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s MP Tulip Siddiq, who represents Hampstead and Kilburn, described the sentence as devastating and shocking. “Another abusive use of her as a bargaining chip,” she said.

Amnesty International UK called on the Government to increase pressure on Iran to free Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe.

“After yet another sham trial and another harsh sentence it’s time, surely, for the UK government to say enough is enough,” said Kate Allen, the charity’s UK director. “In the strongest terms possible, the Government must call on the Iranian authorities to immediately and unconditionally release Nazanin and allow her to return home.”