World News for Students of English

12-03-2021 07:00

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is a British-Iranian woman who was jailed in Iran on spying charges. She has been released after completing a five-year sentence.

However, she has been told that she will have to go to court next week to face more charges.

Zaghari-Ratcliffe was arrested in April 2016 while visiting her parents in Iran with her daughter, and she spent five years in prison for allegedly planning to overthrow the government.

Former Foreign Secretaries Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt attempted to secure her release; however, her situation worsened. Johnson’s false statement that Zaghari-Ratcliffe was training journalists was cited against her in court. Zaghari-Ratcliffe went on a hunger strike in an attempt to draw attention to her plight, and it prompted protests from supporters outside the Iranian Embassy in London.

The charity worker had been under house arrest in Tehran since being moved from jail last March due to the coronavirus pandemic. Despite being found guilty in court, she has always denied the charges against her.

Difficult words: overthrow (to remove forcibly from power), hunger strike (a form of protest when a person refuses to eat), plight (a difficult or unfortunate situation).

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