Hunt warns Iran over political prisoners
JEREMY HUNT has warned Iran against using innocent dual-national Britons as political prisoners for leverage, as he prepared to visit the country for the first time.
The Foreign Secretary called on Iran’s hardline Islamic regime to release people including Nazanin Zaghari-ratcliffe, the charity worker currently jailed on what are widely regarded as trumped-up spying charges.
Mr Hunt, the first Western foreign minister to visit Iran since the US pulled out of a nuclear deal and imposed sanctions on Tehran, also called for its leaders to cease “destabilising activity”.
He is also due to discuss the war in Yemen during his trip, which will include talks with Mohammad Zarif, his counterpart.
Mr Hunt, who is due to arrive in Iran today, said: “We must see those innocent British-iranian dual-nationals imprisoned in Iran returned to their families in Britain.
“I have heard too many heartbreaking stories from families who have been forced to endure a terrible separation. So I arrive in Iran with a clear message for the country’s leaders: putting innocent people in prison cannot and must not be used as a tool of diplomatic leverage.”
Mrs Zaghari-ratcliffe, a British-iranian who works for the Thomson Reuters Foundation, was arrested in April 2016 and later sentenced to five years in jail after being accused of spying, a charge she vehemently denies. Richard Ratcliffe, her husband, has campaigned tirelessly for her release.
Mr Hunt pressed Mr Zarif on her case in September when they met in New York on the fringes of a United Nations General Assembly.
The previous month she had been granted a three-day release but her request for an extension was denied.
Britain and its European allies responded with dismay to Donald Trump’s decision in May to pull out of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that relieved sanctions on Tehran in return for an end to Iran’s military nuclear ambitions.
Downing Street said at the start of this month that Britain would continue to expand trade relations with Iran.