Skip to main content
By

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe: Boris Johnson to meet husband



Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is to meet the husband of a British-Iranian woman jailed in Iran later.
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has been held by Tehran since April 2016 after being accused of spying - charges she denies.
The meeting comes after the foreign secretary said during a Commons committee hearing she was there to train journalists - which could lead to her five-year jail term being doubled.
Her family have always maintained she was on holiday with her daughter.
Mr Johnson has apologised for the "distress" and "suffering" he had caused with the comments he made at the Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee on 1 November, and retracted "any suggestion she was there in a professional capacity".
Some critics called for Mr Johnson to resign, but Richard Ratcliffe said it would not be in his wife's interests.
A Foreign Office statement said the pair will meet to discuss Mr Ratcliffe's request to give his wife "diplomatic protection" - which, under international law, allows a state to take diplomatic action on behalf of a national.
They will also talk about a possible joint trip to Iran before the end of the year and the health of Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who is said to have found lumps in her breasts.
Consular officials will be at the meeting, along with Middle East minister Alistair Burt, who has already met Mr Ratcliffe and visited Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe's family in Tehran.
Mr Ratcliffe welcomed the opportunity to meet Mr Johnson in person, having only spoken to him over the phone.
In an interview with BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Monday, he said: "I think the best chance Nazanin has of coming home this side of Christmas is all of the weight of the Foreign Office and the foreign secretary being focused on doing that."
A statement from the Foreign Office said that Mr Johnson had "made it clear that no stone should be left unturned" in securing the release of Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe.
"The Foreign Office remains very concerned about all our dual nationals detained in Iran and is doing everything it can in each of their cases, including trying to secure access to them and ensure their welfare," it added.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Zimbabwe latest: Defiant Mugabe makes first public appearance

By
Zimbabwe latest: Defiant Mugabe makes first public appearance Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe has made his first public appearance since the country's army took over on Wednesday. He attended a graduation ceremony in the capital, Harare. Mr Mugabe had been under house arrest for days. The army made its move after a power struggle over his successor. The military said on Friday it was "engaging" with Mr Mugabe and would advise the public on the outcome of talks "as soon as possible". Meanwhile Christopher Mutsvangwa, the leader of the influential war veterans' association, said Mr Mugabe should step down at once. He called for a huge turnout in street protests on Saturday. Live updates from Zimbabwe Five things you should know "We want to restore our pride and tomorrow is the day... we can finish the job which the army started, Mr Mutsvangwa said. "There's no going back about Mugabe. He must leave." Mr Mugab...
Post a Comment
Read more
By
Making Girl-child Education a Priority in Africa For 25 years, the Forum of African Women Educationists, a pan-African non-governmental organisation founded in 1992, has been promoting girls and women’s education in sub-Saharan Africa in line with the Education For All. Its Chairperson and first female Vice-Chancellor, University of Cape Coast, Ghana, Professor Nana Opoku-Agyemang explained to Funmi Ogundare its impacts so far, among other issues Gender discrimination is one of the primary impediments to education which affects boys and girls. However, in many parts of the world, girls are most often the victims as they pursue an education. For instance, for many African girls, five years of schooling is the most education they can expect and they are the lucky ones. Across the sub-Saharan region, almost 33 million girls roughly between the ages of six and 15 are not in school. 56 per cent of them may never have set foot in a classroom compared to 41 per cent of out-of-school...
Post a Comment
Read more

Sarah Sanders' absolutely unreal explanation of Trump's anti-Muslim video tweets

By
Sarah Sanders' absolutely unreal explanation of Trump's anti-Muslim video tweets Washington (CNN) On Wednesday morning,  President Donald Trump retweeted three videos purportedly showing Muslims committing acts of violence against Christians . He did so despite the fact that the videos came from a far-right, anti-Muslim group in Britain and remain unverified. Which is all beside the point, according to White House press secretary Sarah Sanders. "Whether it is a real video, the threat is real,"  Sanders told reporters Wednesday morning . "That is what the President is talking about, that is what the President is focused on is dealing with those real threats, and those are real no matter how you look at it." When pressed on the difference between the videos being real or fake, Sanders replied, "I'm not talking about the nature of the video. I think you're focusing on the wrong thing. The threat is real, and that's what the Preside...
Post a Comment
Read more