Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the British-Iranian woman serving a five-year jail sentence in Tehran, has been told by her lawyer that her case has been marked as being eligible for early release, in a development her husband said was positive.

Richard Ratcliffe, who has been calling on Iran to release his wife before Christmas, said on Thursday that the news did not mean her release was guaranteed but viewed it as a positive sign following the visit to the Iranian capital earlier this month by the British foreign secretary, Boris Johnson.

“Yesterday, Nazanin’s lawyer went to visit her – he had an arranged meeting – and he was excited and said that he had checked the database at the judiciary and she was now marked as being eligible for early release. Before it was marked as closed case,” he told the Guardian.



Zaghari-Ratcliffe, held for nearly two years in Tehran’s Evin prison over allegations of spying, had been eligible for early release under Iranian law for a couple of months but doubts emerged after the judiciary last month moved to put her on a new trial for additional charges based on claims of fresh evidence that appear to include a BBC pay stub and contents of her personal email.



Following Johnson’s visit, her new trial, which was scheduled to take place a day after the foreign secretary’s trip, was cancelled. Richard Ratcliffe said her lawyer was under the impression that the authorities were now finalising paperwork for her release.



“That is not the same as having received a letter from the judiciary, but it’s clearly a very good sign. He was excited, and he told her, listen, I think it’s the question of finalising the paperwork. He didn’t say [she’ll be released] tomorrow but within a couple of weeks, he thought. So she was upbeat for that,” Ratcliffe said.

Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s high-profile case has become intertwined with the foreign secretary’s political career since he made an erroneous statement last month, which appeared to complicate her legal battle. Johnson has since apologised for mistakenly saying that she was training journalists in Iran, while in fact she was on holiday.

In Tehran, Johnson raised her plight with his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad Javad Zarif, who met with the chief prosecutor at the weekend in a meeting about issues believed to have included the case.



Richard Ratcliffe said the prosecutor’s deputy visited his wife in prison on Wednesday for the first time. “His deputy went to prison yesterday and met with Nazanin. He didn’t say we’re going to release you, he said, ‘Is there anything you like?’ She said, ‘I like my freedom, thank you.’ I think that’s the first time he’s gone to visit her, so those were positive signs,” he said.



“It’s all positive, it’s not guaranteed just yet but it’s definitely part of that change of ties.”



Zaghari-Ratcliffe has been accused of running “a BBC Persian online journalism course, which was aimed at recruiting and training people to spread propaganda against Iran”. She worked for BBC Media Action between February 2009 and October 2010 before moving to the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the news agency’s charitable arm, as a project manager.

Tulip Siddiq, Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s constituency MP, said the development was “a glimmer of light at the end of a dark tunnel”.



“It has given Nazanin a real boost of positive energy, and now we wait impatiently to see what happens next. Although we do not want to celebrate prematurely, it would be the perfect Christmas gift to see Nazanin released and back with her family where she belongs,” she added.



Amnesty International UK’s individuals at risk campaigner, Kathy Voss, said Zaghari-Ratcliffe should not have been put in prison in the first place, but she welcomed the news about her eligibility for early release as “a sign that Nazanin’s ordeal may be coming to an end”.

She said: “There have already been many ups and downs in Nazanin’s case, so we have to be cautious about any premature celebrations. As far as we’re concerned, this won’t end until Nazanin and [her daughter] Gabriella are actually on a plane and heading back to London.”

A number of other dual nationals languish in Iranian jails on similar charges. Ahmadreza Djalali, an Iranian academic and a resident of Sweden, has been sentenced to death on allegations of aiding Israel in assassinating Iranian nuclear scientists. Earlier this week, he appeared on a state TV programme billed as his confessions but he has since said he was coerced to do so.

