Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe

On April 3, 2016, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was abducted at an Iranian airport while returning to London with her 22-month-old daughter after visiting family in Tehran, setting in motion years of captivity and upheaval.

She was subjected to months of interrogation, falsely accused of attempting to overthrow the Iranian regime—an allegation she consistently denied—and sentenced to five years in prison. Over the next six years, she was held in a range of conditions, including solitary confinement, the general political ward of Evin Prison, electronic tagging and house arrest, during which she was banned from leaving the country.

Following six years of diplomatic negotiations, Zaghari-Ratcliffe was finally able to return home in March 2022. Her release, however, did not mark an easy end to her ordeal. Years of imprisonment had profoundly disrupted her life, and reintegrating into society proved far more difficult than anticipated. She returned with a deep sense that prison had stolen years she could never reclaim, leaving her to learn how to live with an irrevocably changed past.

In the aftermath of her release, she grappled with severe mental and physical consequences of her imprisonment, while simultaneously reconnecting with her family, rebuilding her relationship with her child, re-engaging with her community, and finding her place in society as a survivor of a grave miscarriage of justice.

Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s experience of captivity reaffirmed for her the value of life and freedom. She has since found purpose in sharing her story with others, advocating for political prisoners and prison reform in the UK, and contributing to cultural and public life. Since her release, she has guest-edited a program for BBC Radio 4, judged a journalism prize for the Orwell Foundation, delivered keynote lectures at major book prizes, and received both Harper’s Bazaar Woman of the Year Award and the Courage Under Fire Award from the Magnitsky Human Rights Awards.

Zaghari-Ratcliffe is a contributing editor at Harper’s Bazaar, an Ambassador for Give a Book, and has explored the healing power of craft through collaborations with Liberty and the Imperial War Museum, including designing a fabric collection inspired by incarceration and captivity during times of crisis.