LONDON: Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a British-Iranian woman jailed in Tehran, believes she has contracted the new coronavirus as Iran struggles to contain a surge in new cases, her husband said on Saturday.
The 41-year-old detainee complained that prison authorities are refusing to test her for the COVID-19 virus, despite suffering from a worsening “strange cold,” according to spouse Richard Ratcliffe.
“I am not good. I feel very bad in fact,” Zaghari-Ratcliffe told her husband in a phone call Saturday from the prison, he revealed in a statement.
“For a long time this has not felt like a normal cold,” she added, noting her symptoms included a sore throat, fever and difficulty breathing.
“I know I need to get medicine to get better. This does not go magically.”
Ratcliffe urged British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to ensure that his wife is tested immediately, and that British-Iranians “held hostage in Evin Prison are diplomatically protected.”
His appeal comes as Iran on Saturday reported a surge in new coronavirus cases, with the number of deaths jumping to 43.
But Tehran dismissed as “rumors” a BBC Persian report, citing unnamed sources in the Islamic republic’s health system, that at least 210 people have so far died from the outbreak inside the country.
Ratcliffe warned in his statement that reports suggest COVID-19 has infected Evin Prison.
His wife was arrested at Tehran airport in April 2016 after visiting relatives in Iran with their young daughter.
She worked for the Thomson Reuters Foundation — the media organization’s philanthropic arm — at the time.
Iranian authorities convicted her of sedition — a charge Zaghari-Ratcliffe has always contested — and she is serving a five-year jail term.
Jailed UK-Iranian woman fears she has coronavirus says husband
https://arab.news/wg6d7
Jailed UK-Iranian woman fears she has coronavirus says husband
- The detainee complained that prison authorities are refusing to test her for the COVID-19 virus, despite suffering from a worsening “strange cold”
- Ratcliffe warned in his statement that reports suggest COVID-19 has infected Evin Prison
UN-sanctioned migrant smuggler killed in western Libya
- In June 2018, the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on Al-Dabbashi, along with another five Libyan traffickers
CAIRO: A notorious militia leader in Libya, sanctioned by the UN for migrant trafficking across the Mediterranean Sea, was killed on Friday in a raid by security forces in the west of the country, according to Libyan authorities.
Ahmed Oumar Al-Fitouri Al-Dabbashi, nicknamed Ammu, was killed in the western city of Sabratha when security forces raided his hideout. The raid came in response to an attack on a security outpost by Al-Dabbashi’s militia, which left six members of the security forces severely wounded, according to a statement issued by the Security Threat Enforcement Agency, a security entity affiliated with Libya’s western government.
Al-Dabbashi, who was also sanctioned by the US Treasury for trafficking, was the leader of a powerful militia, the “Brigade of the Martyr Anas Al-Dabbashi,” in Sabratha, the biggest launching point in Libya for Europe-bound African migrants.
Al-Dabbashi’s brother Saleh Al-Dabbashi, another alleged trafficker, was arrested in the same raid, added the statement.
In June 2018, the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on Al-Dabbashi, along with another five Libyan traffickers. At the time, the UN report said that there was enough evidence that Al-Dabbashi’s militia controlled departure areas for migrants, camps, safe houses and boats.
Al-Dabbashi himself exposed migrants, including children, to “fatal circumstances” on land and at sea, and of threatening peace and stability in Libya and neighboring countries, according to the same report.
Al-Dabbashi was also sanctioned by the US Treasury for the same reason.
Libya has been a main transit point for migrants fleeing war and poverty in Africa and the Middle East. The country was plunged into chaos following a NATO-backed uprising that toppled and killed longtime autocrat Muammar Qaddafi in 2011.
The country has been fragmented for years between rival administrations based in the east and the west of Libya, each backed by various armed militias and foreign governments.
