Appeal for Nazanin Zaghari's Five-Year Prison Sentence Rejected

The family of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, an Iranian-British citizen, who has been sentenced to five years in prison by Iran's judiciary, says their appeal for reconsideration of this sentence has been rejected. According to the Associated Press, Richard Ratcliffe, Ms. Zaghari's husband, stated on Monday, April 23, that he learned earlier this week that their appeal had been denied by Iran's judiciary. Nazanin Zaghari, who traveled to Iran for the Nowruz holiday with her young child, was arrested on April 3, 2016, while attempting to leave Iran at Imam Khomeini Airport in Tehran by the IRGC intelligence. According to Iranian media, she has been accused by the detaining authority of 'soft overthrow.' This Iranian-British citizen was working for the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Reuters news agency. Richard Ratcliffe said on Monday that his wife has not yet been informed of the charges against her. He emphasized that their family wants the UK government to publicly call for Ms. Zaghari's release, reject the Iranian officials' accusations against her, and allow the British ambassador in Tehran to visit his wife in prison. The Human Rights Defenders Center reported on April 2 this year that Iranian judicial authorities did not allow Ms. Zaghari to contact her relatives by phone during the Nowruz holidays. Last November, she went on a hunger strike in protest of her solitary confinement and the five-year prison sentence, which ended with her being transferred to the general ward in Evin Prison. Currently, Gisu, Nazanin's two-year-old daughter, is living separately from her parents with her maternal grandparents. Iran's judiciary has not yet commented on the rejection of the Zaghari family's appeal. The Islamic Republic does not recognize dual citizenship and rarely allows foreign countries to have consular access to their citizens imprisoned in Iran. Among Iranian dual nationals currently imprisoned in the Islamic Republic are Siamak Namazi, an Iranian-American citizen, and his father Baquer Namazi, both sentenced to ten years in prison for 'collaborating with a hostile government.' Robin Shahini is another Iranian-American prisoner in Iran who has been sentenced to 18 years in prison but is currently free on a bail of 200 million tomans.