Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

Keir Starmer meets Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe ahead of International Women’s Day

The Labour leader met the former Tehran prisoner during a roundtable event with Iranian and Kurdish women.

Patrick Daly
Monday 06 March 2023 13:58 EST
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe met with Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer ahead of International Women’s Day (Stefan Rousseau/PA)
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe met with Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer ahead of International Women’s Day (Stefan Rousseau/PA) (PA Wire)

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has met with Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe ahead of International Women’s Day.

Sir Keir and Anneliese Dodds, the party’s shadow women and equalities secretary, heard from Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe and her husband Richard as part of a roundtable gathering with 10 Iranian and Kurdish women human rights campaigners.

The roundtable event was convened jointly with Amnesty International UK

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe was detained by Tehran in 2016 and only released last year.

The dual British-Iranian national was captured on April 3 by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) at Imam Khomeini Airport after a holiday visit with her daughter Gabriella to see her parents.

Following six years of imprisonment, she landed back in Britain in March 2022 after the UK finally agreed to settle a £400 million debt dating back to the 1970s, allowing Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe to be reunited with her family.

Monday’s meeting, held in the Opposition leader’s Westminster office, comes ahead of International Women’s Day on Wednesday.

It was understood to be the second time Sir Keir and Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe have met in person since her return to the UK.

The Woman, Life, Freedom roundtable focused on the role of women in the protests across Iran that followed the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in custody last year.

She died in September after being detained by Iranian morality police for not wearing a hijab in accordance with government standards.

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe cut her hair as a gesture of solidarity with the women protesting in Iran following Ms Amini’s passing.

Sir Keir and Ms Dodds heard directly from Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe and other human rights defenders about the harassment and abuse women and girls have faced from the Iranian authorities, Labour said.

Among them included Elika Ashoori, a British-Iranian actress and activist, and daughter of Anoosheh Ashoori – a British hostage who was held in Evin prison for five years.

Labour has called for Iran’s revolutionary guard, a special branch of Tehran’s armed forces, to be formally branded a terror group.

Shadow foreign secretary David Lammy and shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper said in January that the IRGC was “behaving like a terrorist organisation and must now be proscribed as such”.

Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, asked on Monday at a Conservative Home defence conference about whether the IRGC would be proscribed, said the UK Government did not publicly discuss such plans.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in