British-Iranian Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is about to leave Iran where she has been detained for nearly six years, according to reports.
The mother-of-one was booked on a flight to London along with British-Iranian businessman Anoosheh Ashoori, according to their lawyer Hojjat Kermani.
Her MP Tulip Siddiq also tweeted: “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. More details to follow.”
A British negotiating team had been working in Tehran to secure the release of a number of dual nationals.
Just a few hours before the announcement, Prime Minister Boris Johnson described the talks as “moving forward” and “going right up to the wire.”
It was revealed yesterday that Zaghari-Ratcliffe, 43, had her British passport returned to her.
Her sister-in-law Rebecca Ratcliffe said it felt like they were on the “home run,” telling the BBC: “It is quite emotional day today. It feels like we are on the home run now but until she leaves that airport we can’t quite believe it.
“We found out about an hour ago that Nazanin had been picked up and taken to the airport with her parents. She is still actually under Iranian control in the airport.
“She is still not free but it definitely feels she is about to be.”
The apparent breakthrough will bring an end to the grueling ordeal for Zaghari-Ratcliffe which began in 2016 when she was detained at Imam Khomeini airport after a holiday to visit family in Iran with her daughter Gabriella.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe was arrested by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard on trumped up charges of plotting against the regime — which she has always denied.
Gabriella was just 22 months old at the time.
Her mother was sentenced to five years in the notorious Evin Prison and has been detained in Iran ever since.
Gabriella spent three-and-a-half years living with her maternal grandparents in Iran, visiting her mother in prison each week and Skyping her father in the U.K.
She returned to the U.K. to live with her father and start school in October 2019, hoping that her mother would soon follow behind.
Today’s news comes after U.K. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss strongly suggested that Britain was about to settle a £400 million ($523 million) debt to Iran relating to a contract for undelivered tanks.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s detention in Iran has long been linked to the decades-old debt, although Britain denies the two issues are linked.
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