Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe meets Boris Johnson at Downing Street to campaign for more releases from Iran

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is meeting the Prime Minister in Downing Street for the first time since her release from her six-year detention in Iran.

The prime minister’s spokesperson confirmed Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who was held captive for six years in Iran, will be accompanied by her husband Richard Ratcliffe and daughter Gabriella.

The family’s MP Tulip Siddiq, who is also attending, said they will urge Boris Johnson to use his influence to secure the release of other British citizens still held hostage in Iran.

These include Morad Tahbaz, a 66-year-old wildlife conservationist and Mehran Raaoff, a 65-year-old trade unionist.

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe, 43, and fellow British-Iranian national Anoosheh Ashoori, 67, were released in March after the UK agreed to settle a £400m debt with Tehran dating from 1979.

Ahead of the meeting, the PM’s spokesperson said: "We’ve said previously that the prime minister was open to meeting both Nazanin as well as Mr (Anoosheh) Ashoori.

“It is something we have been trying to arrange. I’ve set out that he is going to welcome her to Downing Street to discuss her ordeal in Iran.”

This will be the first meeting between Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Mr Johnson, who in 2017, wrongly claimed that she had been training journalists at the time of her arrest in 2016.

His comments were then cited as proof that she was engaged in “propaganda against the regime”.

Asked whether the PM would be apologising to Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the spokesman replied: "I think it is important to remember that it was the Iranian government who were responsible for her unfair detention, and the decision to release her was always in their gift.

"However, I would point back to the prime minister’s words, his answers to questions on this before and he has previously apologised for his comments in 2017."

Ms Siddiq said: "I was pleased to be invited to Number 10 along with my constituent Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and her family.

“I know her seven-year-old daughter Gabriella was particularly excited to be meeting the prime minister.

"After six long years of unjust and unlawful imprisonment in Iran, Nazanin deserves to hear directly from the prime minister about why it took so long to get her home.

"We will use the meeting as an opportunity to raise the plight of British citizens like Morad Tahbaz who are still being held hostage in Iran and push the prime minister to do much more to secure their release.

“He has a responsibility to ensure that others do not have to endure the six years of torment that Nazanin was put through.

"I will also be submitting evidence to the Foreign Affairs Committee’s inquiry on hostage taking, which I hope will get to the bottom of the government’s abject failure in handling cases like Nazanin’s.

"Never again must the government allow British citizens to be taken hostage with so little done to secure their release and so few reprisals for those responsible."

Earlier this week the family of British-US citizen Morad Tahbaz wrote a letter to President Biden urging him to help secure his release from Iran.

The letter, seen by LondonWorld, said: “We were overjoyed that Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori were finally free and reunited with their families; but envious because our own loved ones remain imprisoned.

“We implore you, Mr President, to fulfill a priority you, your administration, and Congress have repeatedly stated of bringing home our American hostages still held in Iran.

“Morad Tahbaz, a British-American environmentalist held since 2018, was abandoned last month by his native Britain as part of the U.K. initiative to bring home its other two hostages.

“He was briefly furloughed but has since been forced to return to the notorious Evin Prison.

“Mr President, please end this ordeal that has divided our families by circumstances and prison steel.

“We urge you to put the lives of our hostages first and bring them home.”