Displaying items by tag: Nazanin Radcliffe

British charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, jailed in Iran since 2016, says that guards have cancelled her weekly phone calls with her husband and reduced her food rations just days after she announced she would start a hunger strike on 14 January in protest at being barred access to doctors for a breast cancer scare and a painful neurological condition. The food rations reduction affects the whole ward, and is described as a ‘cost-saving measure’. Fellow-prisoner and hunger striker Narges Mohammadi, one of Iran’s most prominent activists, was also not permitted to call her husband and children in France. Nazanin’s husband Richard, who fears she is not strong or well enough to survive a hunger strike, has called for an urgent meeting with the Iranian ambassador to London to discuss her case.

23 March is day 720 of Nazanin Zaghari-Radcliffe’s confinement in Evin prison, nicknamed ‘The Iranian torture factory’. In September she was approved for early release, but Boris Johnson’s comments caused Iranian authorities to believe she was a spy and new charges were made. Her situation became political news, generating a petition of 1.5+ million signatures for her release. Mr Johnson visited Iran ‘to leave no stone unturned’, but an Ayatollah’s fiery Friday sermon described him as a ‘liar and clown’, leading to demonstrations across Iran and the UK. Inside the prison phone calls to and from Nazanin by family were banned and medical visits were cancelled. Just before Christmas, she was told she was ‘eligible for parole.’, but this came to nothing. Nazanin is a Christian suffering post-traumatic stress, being cruelly treated physically and emotionally; pray for her spirit to be strong. See also the article ‘Under Islamism’ in the World section.