TEHRAN: An Iranian-British woman detained in Iran on charges of seeking to overthrow the government was implicated in anti-regime protests in 2009, a judicial official said.
There had previously been scant information about the grounds for the arrest in April of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a 37-year-old employee of the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
But a report from Iran’s Mizan news agency late Friday said she was implicated in mass protests against the re-election of hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009, a movement dubbed “the sedition” by the authorities.
“In 2014-2015, the intelligence service of the Revolutionary Guards in Kerman province identified and arrested members of one of the groups that during the sedition conducted activities against the security of the country by designing websites and carrying out campaigns in the media,” Yadollah Movahed, head of Kerman’s justice department, told Mizan.
“Some of the group were outside Iran, including the suspect Nazanin Zaghari,” he added.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe was arrested at Tehran airport on April 3 as she prepared to return to Britain with her two-year-old daughter after visiting family in Iran.
In June, Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards had said Zaghari-Ratcliffe was accused of being “involved in the soft overthrow of the Islamic republic through... her membership in foreign companies and institutions.”
Iran does not recognize dual citizenship, and if put on trial she will be considered an Iranian.
Held UK-Iranian woman linked to 2009 protests
Held UK-Iranian woman linked to 2009 protests
Independent UN body condemns ‘vicious attacks’ on UN expert on Palestinian rights
- The UN Coordination Committee accused European ministers of relying on “manufactured facts“
- UN experts are commissioned to monitor and document specific human rights crises
GENEVA: An independent United Nations body on Tuesday condemned what it described as vicious attacks based on disinformation by several European ministers against the organization’s special rapporteur for Palestine, Francesca Albanese.
In the past week several European countries, including Germany, France and Italy, called for Albanese’s resignation over her alleged criticism of Israel. Albanese, an Italian lawyer, denies making the remarks.
On Friday, the Czech Republic’s Foreign Minister Petr Macinka quoted Albanese on X as having called Israel a “common enemy of humanity,” and he also called for her resignation.
A transcript of Albanese’s remarks made in Doha on February 7 seen by Reuters did not characterise Israel in this way, although she has consistently criticized the country in the past over the Gaza conflict.
The UN Coordination Committee — a body of six independent experts which coordinates and facilitates the work of Special Rapporteurs — accused European ministers of relying on “manufactured facts.”
“Instead of demanding Ms Albanese’s resignation for performing her mandate...these government representatives should join forces to hold accountable, including before the International Criminal Court, leaders and officials accused of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza,” the Committee said.
It said the pressure exerted on Albanese was part of an increasing trend of politically motivated and malicious attacks against independent human rights experts, UN officials and judges of international courts.
US President Donald Trump’s administration imposed sanctions on Albanese after she wrote letters to US companies accusing them of contributing to gross human rights violations by Israel in Gaza and the West Bank.
UN experts are commissioned by the Geneva-based Human Rights Council to monitor and document specific human rights crises but are independent of the organization itself.
There is no precedent for removing a special rapporteur during their term, although diplomats said that states on the 47-member council could in theory propose a motion to do so.
However, they said strong support for Palestinian rights within the body means that such a motion was unlikely to pass.
