Oct. 10 (UPI) — A British-Iranian woman imprisoned in Iran in 2016 faces more charges, which carry an extra 16 years in prison, her husband said.
Richard Ratcliffe said his wife, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, 38, a project manager with the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the news agency’s charitable arm, learned of the new charges Sunday. Prosecutors said her new charges were for demonstrating outside the Iranian Embassy in London. Ratcliffe also said a judge Zaghari-Ratcliffe associated with organizations “specifically working to overthrow the regime.”
Zaghari-Ratcliffe was previously sentenced to five years in prison for trying to plan a “soft overthrow” of Iran. She was eligible for early release next month, but is expected to remain in prison pending a new trial.
“I have told Nazanin that these are just games by the [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps], games that look more and more desperate. Inventing new charges to prevent her early release does not make them look intimidating, it makes them look foolish,” Ratcliffe told The Guardian.
She was arrested in April 2016 while attempting to board a flight to Britain with her daughter at Tehran Imam Khomeini International Airport.
