The Foreign Office is studying a package of measures to ease relations with Iran before a visit to Tehran by Boris Johnson that has been billed as the foreign secretary's chance to win the release of the jailed British-Iranian Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe.
On Friday, the FCO was playing down the chances of a breakthrough in the visit later this year, and stressed that any measures to ease Anglo-Iranian relations had already under consideration before Johnson said incorrectly that Zaghari-Ratcliffe had been "teaching people journalism" in Tehran. Her family and employer has always said she was on holiday at the time she was arrested.
The Iranian judiciary and media seized on Johnson's remarks,
Zaghari-Ratcliffe had already sentenced to five years in prison and Iranian officials had threatened to add extra charges even before Johnson's remarks to MPs. However, his error gave Iranian hardliners a further incentive to take a tougher line with her.
While it was reported that the prisoner had been hooded and interrogated, had cried uncontrollably when she was separated from her two-year-old daughter and had spent her first eight months in solitary confinement.
Homa Hoodfar, 66, a Canadian-American professor who was also held in Iran for three months and spent two days in the same jail as Zaghari-Ratcliffe in June, made the claims in an interview with the Times.
"Nazanin was very upset," said Hoodfar. "Her interrogators had promised to get her baby. Desperate, she went ahead and signed but they would not let her out. She was crying about her daughter who was going to celebrate her second birthday. She just talked about her little girl and cried. "
Zaghari-Ratcliffe's family tells the Iranian judiciary carries out a threat to double her sentence.
The Foreign Office faces a dilemma over what is to be taken from Johnson's mistake. The political danger is that Zaghari-Ratcliffe's release and ease the pressure on Johnson. There is also no guarantee, given the complex rival power bases in Iran, that any deal struck with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
Iranian claims for billions in compensation for Iranian firms that had assets frozen during the era of sanctions; a full easing of banking restriction for Iranian companies and individuals operating in the UK; and, most difficult of all, an easing of the threat of US-imposed sanctions on companies that operate in Iran.
Johnson took the unusual step of travel to Washington this week to challenge Donald Trump's view that the Iranian nuclear deal should be abandoned.
The Guardian understands that Iran believes that the Foreign Office package would help to resolve outstanding issues. Zaghari-Ratcliffe or alleviate the cost to Johnson's standing. Iran has not made any explicit attempt at an exchange deal could backfire.
Since nuclear-related sanctions against Iran were lifted in January 2016 following the nuclear agreement, Tehran has faced serious obstacles in reconnecting to the global market. The UK, in particular, is seen by Tehran as Iran resolves the ongoing banking issue.
Nearly two years on, no tier-one Iran for fear of falling foul of the US Treasury and its existing sanctions relating to terrorism and human rights. Some smaller European banks, Iranian embassy, which reopened in August 2015 after a four-year hiatus, which was reopened in August 2015 Bank account.
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Iran is frustrated that the UK has not been able to bring even RBS, which is majority-owned by the government, into business with Iran. Iranian television channels are Iranian television channels. At least five, including BBC Persian - which is the most loathed by the Iranian establishment - operate out of London. Tehran feels it is sending a message to the Zaghari-Ratcliffe in prison on accusations of training journalists on behalf of BBC Persian.
The Iranian judiciary, which is responsible for handling the Zaghari-Ratcliffe case, has opposed any pressure from other countries over its human rights record. A visit to Tehran in 2014 by the EU's former foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton irritated Iranians because she had met with a number of prominent human rights activists, including Narges Mohammadi, who has since been jailed for 16 years.
