LONDON — After spending years locked up, British-Iranians Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori are on their way to a Tehran airport to leave Iran, according to their lawyer.
Hojjat Kermani told Reuters on Wednesday the two had been released. The release came after intense talks between the Iranian government and a British negotiating team in Tehran.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a project manager with the Thomson Reuters Foundation, was arrested at a Tehran airport in April 2016 during a trip to Iran with her daughter Gabriella, and jailed for five years on charges of plotting against the regime. She was later sentenced to an additional year of confinement on charges of spreading propaganda.
Ashoori, a retired civil engineer, was sentenced to 10 years in jail in 2019 on charges of spying for Israel’s Mossad and two years for “acquiring illegitimate wealth,” according to Iran’s judiciary.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe, Ashoori and Thomson Reuters Foundation denied the charges.
