LONDON: If Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is sent back to prison following a court hearing on Monday, UK-Iranian relations will be fundamentally changed and “sabotaged” by Tehran’s actions, said British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who is under house arrest in Iran and has been in custody since 2016 on contested charges of espionage, has been told to expect a return to prison following a court appearance on Monday.
“The truth is the detention of Nazanin and other dual nationals in Iran is totally unwarranted,” said Raab.
*****
READ MORE: British-Iranian national Zaghari-Ratcliffe details first prison interrogation
*****
“We’ve made it very clear we want to put the relationship between the UK and Iran on a better footing. If Nazanin is returned to prison that will of course put our discussions and the basis of those discussions in a totally different place. It is entirely unacceptable, it is entirely unwarranted, it is totally unjustified.”
He told the BBC: “I totally understand the horrific position she is in.” Raab said Tehran has been warned that any move to bring fresh proceedings against Zaghari-Ratcliffe “must not happen.”
On Thursday, Iran’s Ambassador to the UK Hamid Baeidinejad was summoned to a meeting at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), where officials informed him of Britain’s “grave concern” over recent developments.
Thomas Drew, the FCO’s director-general for the Middle East, said the envoy was told the move was “unjustified and unacceptable, and is causing an enormous amount of distress,” a spokesman said.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe and her family deny the charges and say she is being used by Tehran as a bargaining chip over an unfulfilled arms deal between Britain and Iran before the 1979 revolution.
