British-Iranian citizen Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, held in Iran since 2016, has been jailed and banned from leaving the country for a year, AFP reported quoting her lawyer on Monday.
The 42-year-old was sentenced for her “propaganda against the system”, a week after she finished a five-year sentence for plotting to overthrow the Iranian regime and spying on the government, accusations she denies.
Nazanin was detained while on a holiday in Tehran in 2016 for taking part in a protest in London 12 years ago.
Before her arrest, she lived in London with her husband Richard Ratcliffe, an accountant.
Nazanin worked as a project manager for the charity Thomson Reuters Foundation in London. She was formerly employed by BBC Media Action, an international development charity.
According to Nazanin, she took her daughter Gabriella, now seven, to Iran in March 2016 to celebrate the country’s new year and visit family.
However, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said she was leading a “foreign-linked hostile network” when she visited the country.
Her husband Richard says that the day (September 6, 2016) she was sentenced to five years in jail, was proof his wife was being held as a political bargaining chip.
As per a BBC report, it has been claimed that Nazanin is being held by Tehran in order to force the UK into settling a multi-million-pound dispute, which dates back to the 1970s.
On Monday, Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson hit out at reports of the sentencing.
“I don’t think it’s right at all that Nazanin should be sentenced to any more time in jail… I think it’s wrong that she’s there in the first place,” he said, adding that London was working “very hard” to secure her release.