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Freed British-Iranian Criticizes UK Release Efforts

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, seen here with her husband and daughter, said she was a pawn in the hands of two governments. (Handout Free Nazanin campaign/AFP file)
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, seen here with her husband and daughter, said she was a pawn in the hands of two governments. (Handout Free Nazanin campaign/AFP file)
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Freed British-Iranian Criticizes UK Release Efforts

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, seen here with her husband and daughter, said she was a pawn in the hands of two governments. (Handout Free Nazanin campaign/AFP file)
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, seen here with her husband and daughter, said she was a pawn in the hands of two governments. (Handout Free Nazanin campaign/AFP file)

A British-Iranian charity worker held in Tehran for six years said on Monday that the UK government could have helped free her earlier, and called for all "unjustly detained" prisoners in Iran to be released.

Speaking publicly for the first time since returning home, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe said the UK government knew that Tehran wanted a historic £400-million ($530-million, 480-million euro) debt to be paid in order for her to be liberated.

"I think it was week two or week three that I was arrested, like six years ago, that they (Iran officials) told me, 'We want something off the Brits. We will not let you go until such time that we get it'," she told a news conference.

"And they did keep their promise," said Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who flew home last Wednesday with retired engineer Anoosheh Ashoori, 67, after London agreed to settle the sum paid by the Shah-era Iranian government for tanks in the 1970s, before the revolution.

She described herself as "a pawn in the hands of two governments" who had been caught up in a wider dispute that had "nothing to do" with her, and said all those unfairly detained in Iran in similar circumstances should be freed.

"The meaning of freedom is never going to be complete (until) such time that all of us who are unjustly detained in Iran are reunited with our families," she added.

"Other dual nationals, members of religious groups, or prisoners of conscience... there are so many other people we don't know their names who have been suffering in prison in Iran."

Zaghari-Ratcliffe, flanked by her husband, Richard, said little of her experience in prison, including in solitary confinement, but said it would "always haunt" her.

She criticized UK diplomatic efforts over the years to get her out, during which time five foreign ministers promised to secure her release.

"I was told many, many times that 'Oh we're going to get you home'," she said.

"What's happened now should have happened six years ago... I shouldn't have been in prison for six years," she said.

Hunger strike
Another British-Iranian, Morad Tahbaz, who also has a US passport, is still being held in Iran, and his daughter Roxanne also spoke at the news conference.

"He should have been on the same flight and it should happen to the other dual nationals," said Zaghari-Ratcliffe.

Tahbaz's sister said earlier on Monday that he had gone on hunger strike and accused the UK government of abandoning him after the two other detainees were released.

"We've only just found out before we started this afternoon that he's been returned to the prison," Roxanne Tahbaz said.

"Contrary to the public statements that have been made, he's not being reunited with his family. And he certainly has not been given a furlough, as was part of the deal that was presented to us.

"From the outset, we were always assured by the (British foreign ministry) that my father would be included in any deal that was made to release all of the hostages."

Environmental campaigner Tahbaz, in his 60s, was only released on furlough from Tehran's Evin prison on Wednesday and was not allowed to leave the country.

After 48 hours he was taken back to prison, reportedly to have an ankle bracelet fitted, but he has not been heard from since.

"We have heard through a relative just now... that he's been taken from the prison and he's been taken to an undisclosed location and that he's gone on hunger strike," his sister Tarane Tahbaz told BBC radio.

The foreign ministry said he was at a "residential location" in Tehran and promised to lobby the Iranian authorities for him to return home immediately.

Spying
A Tehran court in 2020 jailed Tahbaz for 10 years on charges of spying, conspiring with Washington and damaging national security.

He and seven others convicted on similar charges worked with environmental group Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation to track endangered species and were arrested on suspicion of espionage in early 2018.

Project manager Zaghari-Ratcliffe worked for the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the news and data agency, and was arrested in Tehran on a visit to family in 2016, accused of plotting to overthrow the regime.

Ashoori, a retired engineer from southeast London, was arrested in 2017 and jailed for 10 years on charges of spying for Israel.

Dual nationals from Austria, Canada, France, Germany, Sweden and the United States have also been arrested in similar circumstances.

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World

NATO Intercepts Russian Military Aircraft Flying Over the Baltic Sea

In this photo, provided by the French Army on Monday, April 20, 2026, a Russian supersonic Tu-22M3 strategic bomber, right, and an escorting Su-35 Russian fighter jet fly together over the Baltic Sea. (Etat-Major des Armees via AP)
In this photo, provided by the French Army on Monday, April 20, 2026, a Russian supersonic Tu-22M3 strategic bomber, right, and an escorting Su-35 Russian fighter jet fly together over the Baltic Sea. (Etat-Major des Armees via AP)
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NATO Intercepts Russian Military Aircraft Flying Over the Baltic Sea

In this photo, provided by the French Army on Monday, April 20, 2026, a Russian supersonic Tu-22M3 strategic bomber, right, and an escorting Su-35 Russian fighter jet fly together over the Baltic Sea. (Etat-Major des Armees via AP)
In this photo, provided by the French Army on Monday, April 20, 2026, a Russian supersonic Tu-22M3 strategic bomber, right, and an escorting Su-35 Russian fighter jet fly together over the Baltic Sea. (Etat-Major des Armees via AP)

NATO intercepted Russian strategic bombers and fighter jets that flew over the Baltic Sea on Monday, a muscular display of air power on the alliance’s eastern flank away from the spotlight on the Middle East.

French Rafale fighters were deployed from a Lithuanian air base where they are stationed as part of a decades-long NATO air-policing effort. The fighters armed with air-to-air missiles joined jets from Sweden, Finland, Poland, Denmark and Romania. They all took to the skies to inspect and keep watch on the Russian flight, the French detachment said.

The Russian mission included two supersonic Tu-22M3s, as well as about 10 fighters — both SU-30s and SU-35s — that took turns escorting the larger strategic bombers, according to the statement.

The Russian Defense Ministry said the long-range bombers' flight was scheduled and occurred in airspace over the neutral waters of the Baltic Sea. The flight took more than four hours, the ministry said Monday on Telegram.

“At certain stages of the route, the long-range bombers were accompanied by fighters of foreign states,” the ministry said. “Crews of long-range aviation regularly conduct flights over the neutral waters of the Arctic, the North Atlantic, the Pacific Ocean, as well as the Baltic and Black Seas. All flights of Russian Aerospace Forces aircraft are carried out in strict compliance with international rules for the use of airspace.”

The ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday. It often reports flights by its strategic bombers over the Baltic Sea, including in January — when NATO jets also flew up to meet them — and at least four times last year.

NATO’s Allied Air Command also did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.

The military alliance routinely scrambles fighter aircraft to intercept Russian warplanes that approach or fly near NATO airspace. NATO says the Russian planes it intercepts often fail to use their transponders and don't communicate with air traffic controllers or file a flight plan. NATO jets are sent up to identify them.

Many of the Russian flights that NATO monitors with its Baltic air policing mission, in place since Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia joined the alliance in 2004, are to and from the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad. Even before the war in Ukraine, NATO was intercepting Russian planes around 300 times each year, mostly over waters around northern Europe.

A journalist from The Associated Press witnessed the French detachment's response on Monday from the sprawling Šiauliai Air Base in Lithuania. NATO uses the base for fighter patrols that police the skies on the alliance’s eastern flank.

Two French Rafale fighter jets’ two-man crews — a pilot and a navigator — were seen racing in two vans to the planes’ hangars from the headquarters building the French detachment uses during its four-month deployment on the air base.

The crews were already suited up because they’d been on standby, so they would be ready to take to the air within minutes if scrambled.

The two crews quickly took their places in their planes’ cockpits. They were then put on hold, with the planes’ jet engines ignited, until they got the order to take off. Then they taxied out of their hangars and roared off into the clear skies.

Monday's flight was the latest in Russia's maneuvers over the Baltic Sea.

Lithuania's defense ministry said NATO jets were scrambled four times from April 13-19 to intercept Russian aircraft that violated flight rules that included turning off flight transponders and flying without a flight plan.

World

Iran Arrests More Than 3,600 on Charges Related to War, Says NGO

People walk past a banner with a picture of the late Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander Mohammad Pakpour, in Tehran Bazaar, amid a ceasefire between US and Iran, in Tehran, Iran, April 21, 2026. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via Reuters
People walk past a banner with a picture of the late Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander Mohammad Pakpour, in Tehran Bazaar, amid a ceasefire between US and Iran, in Tehran, Iran, April 21, 2026. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via Reuters
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Iran Arrests More Than 3,600 on Charges Related to War, Says NGO

People walk past a banner with a picture of the late Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander Mohammad Pakpour, in Tehran Bazaar, amid a ceasefire between US and Iran, in Tehran, Iran, April 21, 2026. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via Reuters
People walk past a banner with a picture of the late Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander Mohammad Pakpour, in Tehran Bazaar, amid a ceasefire between US and Iran, in Tehran, Iran, April 21, 2026. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via Reuters

Iranian authorities have arrested more than 3,600 people on charges related to the US-Israeli war ranging from sharing videos with media outlets based overseas to possessing Starlink internet terminals, an NGO said on Tuesday.

Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) said the figure, based on state media reports and its own research, represented a minimum given the current internet restrictions in the country, and that the actual number of arrests was "likely much higher".

It said at least 3,646 people had been arrested since the war broke out on February 28, with at least 767 of the cases reported after the start of a ceasefire on April 8.

"The charges levelled against the detainees predominantly include espionage, communicating with foreign intelligence services, transmitting images or coordinates of sensitive locations to foreign-based media, and attempting to establish operational cells or conduct armed activities," it said.

People have also been arrested for using and distributing Starlink satellite-based internet terminals to circumvent internet blackouts, and for alleged cooperation with pro-monarchist groups.

IHR said more than 100 civil society activists were among those arrested, including prize-winning rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh, who was detained on April 2.

Sotoudeh's daughter Mehraveh Khandan wrote on Instagram on Saturday that her mother had telephoned for the first time since her arrest, saying she was being held by the intelligence ministry but was not allowed to disclose where.

Her fellow rights activist and 2023 Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi remains in prison after her arrest in December, which took place before the war and mass protests in January.

Mohammadi on Tuesday turned 54 behind the bars of her prison in the northern city of Zanjan, her foundation said, after warning last week her health was "critical" following a heart attack in March.

World

US Forces Board a Sanctioned Oil Tanker in the Indian Ocean, the Pentagon Says

Tankers and bulk carriers anchored in the Strait of Hormuz, Saturday, April 18, 2026. (AP)
Tankers and bulk carriers anchored in the Strait of Hormuz, Saturday, April 18, 2026. (AP)
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US Forces Board a Sanctioned Oil Tanker in the Indian Ocean, the Pentagon Says

Tankers and bulk carriers anchored in the Strait of Hormuz, Saturday, April 18, 2026. (AP)
Tankers and bulk carriers anchored in the Strait of Hormuz, Saturday, April 18, 2026. (AP)

US forces have boarded an oil tanker previously sanctioned for smuggling Iranian crude oil in Asia, the Pentagon said Tuesday, as it puts into place a global warning to track down vessels tied to Tehran.

US forces “conducted a right-of-visit maritime interdiction” and boarded the M/T Tifani “without incident,” the Pentagon said on social media.

The Tifani was captured in the Bay of Bengal — between India and Southeast Asia — and was carrying Iranian oil, according to a US defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing military operation. The US military will decide in the next four days what to do with the vessel, such as tow it back to the US or turn it over to another country, the official said.

It's the latest move in the US war on Iran to stop any ship tied to Tehran or those suspected of carrying supplies that could help its government, from weapons and oil to metals and electronics. The announcement comes ahead of the expiration of an already tenuous ceasefire between the US and Iran, and as Pakistan attempts to broker talks between Washington and Tehran.

It is the second vessel linked to Iran that has been interdicted by the US military. The US Navy attacked and seized an Iranian-flagged cargo ship Sunday that it said had tried to evade its blockade of Iranian ports, with President Donald Trump saying an American destroyer blew a hole in the ship’s engine room.

Targeting Iran-linked ships in international waters The Pentagon on social media described the Tifani as “stateless” despite it being a Botswana-flagged vessel.

“As we have made clear, we will pursue global maritime enforcement efforts to disrupt illicit networks and interdict sanctioned vessels providing material support to Iran — anywhere they operate,” the Pentagon announcement said, echoing previous statements from Trump administration officials. “International waters are not a refuge for sanctioned vessels.”

Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said last week that the enforcement actions would extend beyond Iranian waters and the area under control of US Central Command.

US forces in other areas of responsibility, he told reporters at the Pentagon, “will actively pursue any Iranian-flagged vessel or any vessel attempting to provide material support to Iran.” He specifically pointed to operations in the Pacific and said the US would target vessels that left before the blockade began outside the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway for energy and other shipments.

The military also detailed an expansive list of goods that it considers contraband, declaring that it will board, search and seize them from merchant vessels “regardless of location.” A notice published Thursday says any “goods that are destined for an enemy and that may be susceptible to use in armed conflict” are “subject to capture at any place beyond neutral territory.”

Blockades can be lawful in wartime, expert says

The US military’s actions against Iranian-linked vessels, namely the attack over the weekend on the cargo ship named the Touska, have raised questions about the two-week ceasefire.

The US and Iran are operating in “an awkward space where the law doesn’t give you a clean yes-or-no answer” on whether the ceasefire was violated, said Jason Chuah, a law professor at the City University of London and the Maritime Institute of Malaysia.

“The United States seems to take the line that the conflict never fully switched off — that is there is still a state of armed conflict,” Chuah said. “By saying that, it can keep doing things like enforcing a blockade and even using limited force at sea.”

But Iran is treating the ceasefire as a pause on all hostile acts, Chuah said. Iran’s joint military command has called the armed boarding an act of piracy and a violation of the ceasefire.

The US earlier had instituted a blockade against sanctioned oil tankers linked to Venezuela but had never fired on those vessels.

Blockades and even limited attacks on vessels can be lawful in wartime, with merchant vessels becoming legitimate targets if they contribute to military actions, carry contraband or are incorporated into enemy logistics, Chuah said.

It's harder to prove that a ship such as the Touska is realistically contributing to military action against the US, Chuah said.

“The whole dispute really turns on a deceptively simple question: Did the ceasefire actually suspend the right to use force?” Chuah said. “If it did, then firing on vessels or seizing them is very hard to square with the United Nations Charter.”

Mark Cancian, a retired Marine colonel and a senior defense adviser with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said a violation is up for interpretation because there were no defined terms.

“Trump announced it. The Iranians agreed. But there’s no formal agreement,” Cancian said. “So whether it broke the ceasefire or not depends on your perspective. ... Nothing was written down.”

Michael O’Hanlon, a defense and foreign policy analyst at the Brookings Institution, said the US did not violate the ceasefire because it was limited to bombing Iran, not the blockade.

“We agreed to stop dropping bombs on them, and that’s the basic thing they wanted,” O’Hanlon said, adding that the US still had to enforce the blockade “if you’re going to make it mean anything.”