37-year-old Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has been detained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards since April, after she was prevented from boarding her flight back home to London with her daughter, Gabriella Ratcliffe.
The British Iranian was on holiday with her daughter visiting family, but when she went to check in members of the Revolutionary Guard were waiting for her.
Here they informed Nazanin that there was a problem with her passport, handed Gabriella to her grandparents and took the mum away for questioning.
"Their baby daughter Gabriella has also had her British passport taken off her, and whilst she is staying with Naz's parents, she can't get back to my cousin Ricky who didn't go on the holiday as he was working," Richard's cousin Alex Loftus explained to MummyPages.
"As she was boarding the plane, she was arrested and has now been in solitary confinement for nearly 40 days. She has not been charged with anything."
According to her family, Nazanin, who is a project co-ordinator for the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, was forced to sign a confession under duress, and officials have said she is being detained on issue of “National Security”.
She has been sent to an unknown location in Kerman Province, 1,000 kilometres south of Tehran.
Her 23-month-old daughter, who has British citizenship only and a British passport, has been forced to remain with her grandparents while her mum is in confinement. Last week, Gabriella was allowed visit her mum in a hotel along with her grandparents.
“It was stage-managed, but they had three hours together, lunch and a chance to play,” Richard told the Evening Standard.
However, the authorities, who gave the youngster a doll, said they were only allowing access because of Gabriella.
“We’re not doing this for Nazanin,” they reportedly told the family.
“We’re doing it for Gabriella because she’s not done anything wrong, so she can see her mother.”
While Nazanin has been in contact with her parents via irregular phone calls, she is not allowed talk to her husband because he doesn’t speak Farsi.
Talking about why he has decided to go public against his in-laws and the Foreign Office’s advice, Richard told the publication: “Within three days she’s been able to see her baby. The media has done that. But I’ve just left my wife for 38 days in solitary confinement. That’s awful.”
Richard has set up a Change.org petition to help get his wife home, and is calling on the Prime Minister to “use his power and intervene”.
