British-Iranian assist employee Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has her ankle monitor eliminated however faces new courtroom date
Zaghari-Ratcliffe has been underneath home arrest for nearly a 12 months due to the coronavirus pandemic. Her five-year sentence was on account of finish on Sunday.
Iran’s semi-official news agency Isna quoted Nazanin-Zaghari’s lawyer Hojjat Kermani as saying she would be tried on her other charge on March 14.
UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said he welcomed the news. “We welcome the removing of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s ankle tag, however Iran’s continued therapy of her is insupportable,” he tweeted on Sunday. “She have to be allowed to return to the UK as quickly as potential to be reunited together with her household.”
On Sunday, British MP Tulip Siddiq, who has been in touch with Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s family, said Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s first trip after having the ankle tag removed would be to visit her grandmother.
An employee of the Thomson Reuters Foundation, Zaghari-Ratcliffe was detained at Tehran airport in April 2016. She was attempting to return home to London after visiting family with her daughter Gabriella, who was then 22 months old.
The Iranian government accused her of working with organizations allegedly attempting to overthrow the regime, charges she and Thomson Reuters Foundation consistently denied. She was sentenced to five years in jail.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe, now 42, was moved from prison to house arrest during the peak of the coronavirus pandemic in Iran. According to the British government, she was still in house arrest earlier this year.
She was given British diplomatic protection in 2019 and has been designated a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International.
Speaking in the Parliament earlier this year, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the government was “doing the whole lot we are able to” to secure Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s release from “the fully unjustified detention in Tehran.”
Lindsay Isaac and Hande Atay Alam contributed to this report.