Boris Johnson Presses Iran on Detained Britons

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TEHRAN — Britain’s foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, expressed concern on Saturday in Tehran about British-Iranian citizens detained in Iran, a group that includes Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, whose trial and imprisonment has stirred tensions between the two nations.

Mr. Johnson, who was accused of worsening Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s situation with remarks earlier this year, met with Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif during his first visit to the region as foreign secretary. They were to discuss a number of issues, including Britain’s debt to the Iranian government, the Iran nuclear agreement and the conflict in Yemen, which has spawned one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.

Before the trip, Mr. Johnson said in a statement that he would also “stress my grave concerns about our dual national consular cases and press for their release where there are humanitarian grounds to do so.” The British Foreign Office said later on Saturday that Mr. Johnson “had a constructive meeting” with Mr. Zarif that included discussion of the cases.

Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe, 38, an employee of the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the independent charitable arm of the news agency, was arrested in 2016 while she and her daughter, a toddler, were visiting family in Iran. Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe was sentenced to a five-year prison term on charges of plotting to overthrow Iran’s government.

This year, Mr. Johnson infuriated those working to free Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe by saying she had been “simply teaching people journalism” in Iran. Her employer, relatives and local parliamentary representative said his statement about her activities was untrue.

Days later, Mr. Johnson’s words were cited at a court hearing as evidence that Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe had engaged in “propaganda against the regime.” Mr. Johnson apologized for what he said had been a mistake.

Relations between the Iran and Britain had been frosty since hard-liners ransacked the British Embassy in the Iranian capital in 2011, a move that led to its closing. Ties improved after Iran struck a nuclear agreement with Western nations in 2015, but many Iranian hard-liners distrust Britain, accusing the country of having historically meddled in its affairs, and view Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe as a spy.

Mr. Johnson’s three-day trip to the Middle East took him to Oman on Friday, and he is expected to visit the United Arab Emirates on Sunday.

Britain is considering settling a longstanding debt to Iran by repaying about 400 million pounds, or about $537 million, from a pre-1979 arms deal involving hundreds of Chieftain tanks that were never delivered.

Both Britain and Iran say a repayment would not be tied to Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s case, though the United States made a similar payment to Iran in 2016, around the time that four American citizens were released.

Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s husband, Richard Ratcliffe, who had pushed to join Mr. Johnson on the visit, has raised concerns about his wife’s mental health, citing the growing toll of her prolonged incarceration in Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison.

Mr. Ratcliffe told British news outlets recently that his wife faced trial on new charges on Sunday that carry the possibility of 16 more years in prison.

Iran has held several foreigners on charges such as espionage, a continuing source of tension with Western nations. Many of the detainees are Iranians with dual citizenship.

At least four Americans and two permanent residents of the United States are known to be held in Iranian prisons. A fifth American, Robert A. Levinson, vanished in Iran more than a decade ago.

One of the incarcerated Americans, Xiyue Wang, a graduate student in history from Princeton University, was recently transferred to an Evin Prison wing where he feels extremely unsafe because of hostility from other inmates, according to his wife, Hua Qu. She is able to speak with him sometimes on a phone line monitored by the Iranian authorities.

In a phone interview on Saturday, she said her husband had been threatened by an inmate once held by the United States at Guantánamo Bay.

“He feels like he’s living in terror every day,” she said. “I’m deeply worried about how the U.S. is going to resolve the case. I hope they accelerate the effort.”

Human Rights Watch also expressed concern on Saturday about worsening conditions for Mr. Wang, who was convicted on charges of spying for the United States after he had done research for his thesis on 19th-century archives that were open to the public.

Mr. Wang has strongly denied any wrongdoing, and Princeton has urged Iran to release him.