British charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe freed from Iran after nearly six years

4 yıl önce

LONDON â A British-Iranian woman who has been detained by Iran for almost six years is on her way back to the U.K., a British lawmaker said Wednesday.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a project manager with the Thomson Reuters Foundation, was given a five-year jail sentence in 2016 after Iranian authorities accused her of plotting to overthrow Iranâs government. She and her family denied the charges, saying she was on holiday with her daughter, visiting family in Tehran.

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She spent almost five years in prison before she was released to house arrest at her parentsâ home in Tehran.

On Wednesday, British member of Parliament Tulip Siddiq, who has long campaigned for her release, tweeted that the charity worker was âat the airport in Tehran and on her way home.â Earlier this week, the lawmaker said that Zaghari-Ratcliffe had been given back her British passport.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson had also said earlier on Wednesday said that a negotiating team was at work in Tehran to free Zaghari-Ratcliffe.

Iranâs state-run Fars News Agency, calling Zaghari-Ratcliffe a âspyâ, said in a report published Tuesday that her release had come after Britain had agreed to unfreeze more than $500 million in frozen Iranian funds, as well as to the release of an unnamed Iranian citizen imprisoned in the U.K. Fars said another dual British-Iranian citizen, Anousheh Ashouri, was also being freed.

Kareem Fahim in Istanbul contributed to this report.