What did Nazanin say at her first news conference since being released from an Iranian jail?

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has spoken publicly for the first time since she returned to the UK after being detained in Iran for six years.

As well as thanking her husband and supporters who got her home, she was also critical of the government for the delays in paying a 1979 debt to Iran that contributed to her “cruel” six-year detention.

Here we take a look at the key comments she made in her first news conference since her release.

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Her six years in prison

Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe declined to answer the majority of questions about what it was like in solitary confinement or her time in prison.

However, she did say her experiences “will always haunt” her.

She said: “There is no other way around it. It will be with me.

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“It is never going to leave you alone.

“But I think at the moment I would rather just focus on the moments of coming back.”

When asked by Sky’s political editor Beth Rigby if she is angry it took so long to secure her release, she replied: “I always felt like I am holding this black hole in my heart all these years, but I’m just going to leave that black hole on the plane when it lands.”

She added: “Over the past six years, it has been cruel, what happened to me.”

The foreign secretaries who tried to secure her release

Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe was critical of the foreign secretaries who attempted to secure her release, even publicly disagreeing with her husband when he thanked them.

“The journey back home was tough,” she said.

“I grant what Richard said to thank the foreign secretary, I do not really agree with him on that level.

“I have seen five foreign secretaries changed over the course of six years. That is unprecedented given the politics of the UK.

“I love you, Richard. I respect whatever you believe. But I was told many, many times that, ‘oh, we’re going to get you home’. That never happened. So there was a time that I felt like, you know what, I’m not going to trust you because I’ve been told many, many times that I’m going to be taken home.

“But that never happened. I mean, how many foreign secretaries does it take for someone to come out? Five. It should have been one.”

She said her release should have been secured shortly after she was first detained, adding: “What happened now should have happened six years ago.”

Her husband’s campaigning

Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe praised her “amazing, wonderful husband” for his “tireless campaigning for me” but Richard Ratcliffe used the press conference to reiterate that he was “retiring” from this.

She also thanked her young daughter Gabriella, who has been “very, very patient with Mummy”.

Mr Ratcliffe said the family planned to “disappear off and heal a bit” after the news conference.

Her daughter

Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe said she has “lots of catching up to do” with her daughter.

Asked about how quickly she is getting back to normal life, she said she is “still living in a suitcase” as she hasn’t gone home yet.

But she said she is looking forward to taking her daughter Gabriella on the school run and getting to know her friends.

She also revealed a phone conversation she had with her young daughter when she was still in Iran, in which Gabriella told her: “Mummy, you do realise you are famous.”

But her daughter made sure to put her in her place, saying she is “not gonna be famous forever – maximum a week”.

Laughing as she shared the anecdote, Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe said her family is “bracing ourselves for a week of fame”.

Returning to Iran

“I must admit that I felt like my mum would be very, very upset. She was not, she was so happy that this whole thing is over,” she said.

When asked about returning to Iran, she replied: “You know my opinion on that, it took me six years to come back.

“I think I will be very, very cautious [about going back].”

The other detainees

Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe called for an end to the detention of other dual nationals still held in Iran, saying without their release “the meaning of freedom is never going to be complete”.

She said she understands how the family of Morad Tahbaz are feeling right now: “He was left behind, so I fully understand what he’s going through at the moment because it is disappointing.”

“He should have been on the same flight as us,” she added.

British-born Mr Tahbaz – who has cancer – remains detained in Iran.

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The £400m debt

Although she declined to answer the majority of political questions, Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe says: “I don’t think anybody’s life should be linked to a global kind of agreement, whatever that is, whether it’s nuclear, whether it’s environment or whatever.

“Every human being has got the right to be free.”

Referencing the historic debt, she continued: “And what really upset me all this year is my life was linked to something which has got nothing to do with me.”

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Celebrating Mother’s Day

One reporter asked how she would be celebrating her first Mother’s Day with Gabriella in six years, given that three years ago Richard and Gabriella handed a Mother’s Day card into Number 10 Downing Street to try and secure her freedom.

“I didn’t know that Sunday is Mother’s Day,” she replied laughing.

“The only thing I knew was yesterday was Nawruz, the Persian New Year. And the only thing I did was sitting, we just quickly put the table together with the people that we were with we just sat down and I just talked to my family and enjoyed the moment.

“So we’ll see how it goes.”

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