‘Happily ever after’: Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s husband speaks of joy as British-Iranian mother returns home

‘Happily ever after is a journey not an arrival. But we will get there with patience and love’

The husband of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, held hostage in Iran since 2016, has spoken of his plans to play board games, drink tea and work on moving on towards “a happily ever after” with his wife, as she finally arrived home following her six-year ordeal.

Richard Ratcliffe has not seen his wife Nazanin, 43, since she was detained on spy charges by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) while holidaying in Tehran in April 2016. Their daughter Gabriella, who is now seven, was with her mother when she was arrested, but was eventually brought back to the UK for school. She has not seen her mother since October 2019.

Talking to The Independent from a safe house, as Gabriella chatted about “playing games with mummy” in the background, Mr Ratcliffe spoke of the family’s immense relief but also the “uphill battle” ahead to rebuild their lives together.

He said that his wife was “very agitated” when she was taken to Tehran airport as she was still surrounded by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) personnel and could only relax when she landed in Oman, which has acted as a diplomatic broker. Only there he said the realisation that she was finally free and that their nightmare was over sunk in.

“It hasn’t caught up with me that it’s happened. We had a couple of days of inching closer and closer to her release but not quite being there. So I only believed it when she was taken to the airport,” he explained as Gabriella excitedly talked about her mother’s return and the tooth fairy visiting at the same time.

“It’s disorientating to let your guard down, to realise that you no longer have to keep battling, that we can finally be a normal family.

“Last night there was relief.  We realised we are not fighting with the government any more. It is a lot to process.”

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe was sentenced to five years in prison after being convicted of plotting the overthrow of Iran’s government (TulipSiddiq)

Mr Ratcliffe said amid the joy the family was also bracing for the reunion, as relatives of other hostages had warned them about the difficulty of building a “happy ever after” following so much trauma.

He said that they would need to work on getting a balance back and planned to start with simple pleasures, like playing Gabriella’s favourite board game: Perudo.

“We will have a couple of days here of just catching up with each other. It will probably involve having a cup of tea together, hanging out, learning to be normal and playing games.”

Addressing Gabriella who was with him on the phone, he added: “Daddy is not very good at playing games unlike mummy. He spends too much time on the phone, he is too often campaigning. He will need to have more balance in life and play a few more games, have more fun.”

Mr Ratcliffe has twice been on hunger strike while campaigning for his wife’s return (PA)

An employee of Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of the news agency, Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe was sentenced to five years in prison after being convicted of plotting the overthrow of Iran’s government, a charge that she, her supporters and rights groups deny.

Boris Johnson, as foreign minister in 2017, complicated efforts to free Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe by saying incorrectly that she was training journalists when she was arrested. He later apologised, though Iranian media repeatedly pointed to his remarks.

She had been under house arrest at her parents’ home in Tehran for the last two years.

Mr Ratcliffe and her supporters believe she was being held as leverage while Britain and Iran negotiated a long-running dispute over a debt of some £400m owed to Tehran by London.

Before the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the late Iranian shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi paid the sum for Chieftain tanks that were never delivered.

After years of deadlock and cruel moments of false hope, the  government appeared to have made a breakthrough with an agreement to repay that debt in a way that complies with British and international sanctions.  The government declined to offer details of the arrangement.

But it has meant that Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe was able to leave Iran alongside a second British hostage, Anoosheh Ashoori, 67. Both are expected to land in Britain early on Thursday morning.

A third detainee, Morad Tahbaz, who holds US, British and Iranian citizenship, was released from prison on furlough as part of the same deal, according to the government.

Foreign secretary Liz Truss triumphantly told MPs on Wednesday that the change of government in Iran last summer had been instrumental in moving the talks forward. The recently elected president, Ebrahim Raisi, is a hard-line protege of Iran’s supreme leader known for his hostility to the west.

“I was able to reset the relationship, to be clear that we were serious about resolving the outstanding issues that Iran had, and they were clear they were serious about resolving the outstanding issues we had,” she said in the House of Commons.

Back at the safe house Mr Ratcliffe said he and his wife would need to re-learn how to “step lightly in the world’ after so much trauma.

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe was interrogated for hours, often blindfolded, while in solitary confinement at the beginning of her detention. At points she has collapsed from ill health and suffered pain and hair loss from the stress.

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe was able to leave Iran alongside a second British hostage, Anoosheh Ashoori (via REUTERS)

Mr Ratcliffe, meanwhile, has twice been on hunger strike while campaigning for his wife’s return.

“I’ve been a professional curmudgeon for years and she has had a very tough experience, which has been fairly debilitating at times,” he admitted, adding that there was emotional “baggage” that they would have to move beyond.

“We need to learn to enjoy the jam in life, the simple things. We need to not let the bad stuff define us.

“The happily ever after is a journey not an arrival. But we will get there with patience and love.”