An appeals court in Iran on Saturday upheld one-year prison term for British-Iranian aid worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe as per her lawyer who was quoted by an Iranian news website
"The appeals court has approved the lower court's verdict without holding a hearing," attorney Hojjat Kermani told the Emtedad website.
An Iranian court had sentenced Zaghari-Ratcliffe to a new term in jail in April. She faced charges of propaganda against Iran's ruling system. The new sentence came just a month after she finished a prior five-year sentence.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a project manager with the Thomson Reuters Foundation, was arrested at a Tehran airport in April 2016 and later convicted of plotting to overthrow the clerical establishment.
There was no immediate official comment from Iran's judiciary on the appeals court decision.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe's family and the foundation have denied the charges. The foundation is a charity that operates independently of media firm Thomson Reuters and its news subsidiary Reuters.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who served out most of her first sentence in Tehran's Evin prison, was released in March 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic and kept under house arrest. In March 2021, she was released from house arrest but she was summoned to court again on the new charge.
British lawmaker Tulip Siddiq said she had spoken to Zaghari-Ratcliffe's husband Richard.
"Nazanin has lost her latest appeal and her sentence of 1 year plus 1 year travel ban is upheld with no court hearing. She could now be returned to prison at any time," Siddiq said in a tweet, urging Prime Minister Boris Johnson to intervene.
(With inputs from agencies)
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