“I'm joining to show solidarity with Richard and to put pressure on the British government to take a more serious approach to the issue of British hostages in Iran,” states Ms. Ashoori. “So far, for over five years, their strategy has failed and people like my father, among many others, still languish inside a prison cell while the governments don't treat the issue with the urgency it deserves. We want to make it very difficult for them to carry on downplaying the severity of this problem.”
Mariam Claren, a signer of the Emergency Appeal whose mother Nahid Taghavi (a German-Iranian dual national) has also been unjustly imprisoned, sent a solidarity statement supporting Ratcliffe’s hunger strike:
“It's a shame that Richard has had to go on his second hunger strike in the last two years. And it is more shameful, that the British Government has failed for over five years to protect Nazanin and fight for her freedom. If the problem is between two governments over an old debt, why must an innocent mother be made to suffer? There are no excuses for human rights violations – in the Islamic Republic or the UK.”
“The International Emergency Campaign to Free Iran’s Political Prisoners (IEC) supports Richard Ratcliffe in his courageous hunger strike, and we demand the immediate and unconditional release of all dual nationals being illegitimately imprisoned by Iran,” says spokesperson Larry Everest. “We call on all who stand for justice to sign and urgently spread An Emergency Appeal: The Lives of Iran’s Political Prisoners Hang in the Balance – We Must ACT NOW! demanding freedom for all Iran's political prisoners.”
The Appeal concludes: "We demand of the Islamic Republic of Iran: FREE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS NOW"
"We say to the U.S government: NO THREATS OR WAR MOVES AGAINST IRAN, LIFT U.S. SANCTIONS"
It has been endorsed by some 3,000 people globally, including Cornel West, Noam Chomsky, Gloria Steinem, Ariel Dorfman, Jody Williams, Daniel Ellsberg, Judith Butler, and Raymond Lotta, and appeared as an ad on the back cover of the Summer issue of the New York Review of Books.
