The sister-in-law of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has told of the "special moments" her family have shared since the jailed British-Iranian national finally returned to the UK. Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe, her husband Richard and her daughter Gabriella are "looking forward to a new life" together after being reunited following a six-year ordeal.
There were big hugs all round as Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe - together with fellow freed dual national Anoosheh Ashoori - landed at Brize Norton military airbase in Oxfordshire in the early hours of Thursday (March 17) morning. She had been detained in Iran since 2016, having been accused of plotting to overthrow the Iranian government, which she denies.
The mum-of-one was pictured on the plane returning her to the UK on Wednesday afternoon. Labour's Tulip Siddiq, the family's local MP, confirmed the news on Twitter, writing: "Nazanin is at the airport in Tehran and on her way home. I came into politics to make a difference, and right now I’m feeling like I have."
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Appearing on Good Morning Britain on Thursday, Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe's sister in law, Rebecca Ratcliffe, who works as a GP in Newport, said the family "struggled to believe" she was finally coming home after waiting for nearly six years and campaigning desperately for her release.
She told hosts Ben Shephard and Susanna Reid: "We've had so many close calls where there's been planes waiting to take her home or we've had phone calls from the British Embassy saying that she's about to come home and and so we found it really hard this week to get too excited. We struggled to believe she was coming home until we saw her on that flight. So, that first photo of her on the flight finally taking off - I think that's when it first started to sink in that she might be coming home and we might get our girl back again."
When asked if seven-year-old Gabriella was overwhelmed by her mother's return, Ms Ratcliffe added: "I think it's difficult for her to comprehend. This is a little girl who for most of her life has not known a childhood with both of her parents. She's known a childhood with Mummy and Granny and she's known a childhood with Daddy. So this is something she has been wanting for a long time but probably doesn't quite know how to cope with. But she gets to see her Mummy and I've just heard from Richard, she slept in the bed in between them last night."
Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe was arrested in April 2016 as she prepared to fly back to the UK, having taken her daughter Gabriella - then not even two years old - to see relatives. She was accused of plotting to overthrow the Iranian government and sentenced to five years in jail, spending four years in Tehran's Evin Prison and one under house arrest. Both the British Government and Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe have always denied the allegations.
Her release follows months of intensive diplomatic negotiations between London and Tehran – including the eventual payment of an £400 million debt dating back to the 1970s owned to Iran by the UK. Clearing the debt - which relates to an order of 1,500 Chieftain tanks that was not fulfilled after the shah was deposed and replace by a revolutionary regime - has been affected by strict sanctions in the country.
Appearing on GMB, government minister James Cleverly MP said the debt repayment would be "ring fenced for humanitarian needs" and made completely in accordance with international sanctions. When Susanna Reid commented that the repayment "looked like a ransom payment", Mr Cleverly responded: "The situation is unique. We owed Iran that money. It was for a deal from over 40 years ago, we've been rowing about this between the two countries since that date, for decades.
He added: "There was a legal decision which went against the UK, and we abide by that legal decision, but there were practical difficulties. You can't just write a cheque because of all those sanctions, because of all those counter-terrorism and counter-money laundering laws. But we found a way to ensure that we can repay the debt that we owed and do so in a way that didn't breach sanctions or terrorist financing laws."
"Foreign secretaries, Boris, Jeremy, Dominic, Liz have worked incredibly hard on this, as have the officials in the Foreign Office. There have been a number of occasions where we thought we might get a breakthrough and we had been thwarted. The simple fact is that a change of government in Iran seemed to have helped. The Foreign Secretary had the first face to face meeting with her counterpart and I had the first face to face meeting with my counterpart for the first time in over three years and we finally got to a position where we could come to an arrangement that was acceptable to the Iranians but also complied with those sanctions and restrictions."
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