BORIS Johnson today admitted he feels “a deep sense of anguish” of the fate of jailed mum Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe.
But the Tory leadership frontrunner again denied that he is responsible for the fact she’s languishing in an Iranian prison.
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BoJo was accused of making the situation worse by telling MPs Nazanin was teaching journalism when she went on holiday in Iran.
Challenged on her plight today, Mr Johnson told Sky News: “I feel sorry for her, for her daughter, for her husband Richard and I’ve said this many, many times. I feel a deep sense of anguish for what she has been going through.
“When it comes to responsibility for what she is suffering I think that is incredibly important that we in the UK do not unwittingly give aid and succour to the people who are really responsible, which is not the Foreign Office, not the former Foreign Secretary, and no-one in London is responsible for incarcerating Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe.
“The people who are responsible are the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and anything you do to exculpate them is, I think, a great shame.”
He added: “I do feel a deep sense of anguish about it as I have said and I have apologised several times in the House of Commons and elsewhere.
“But it is very very important that in this conversation we don’t allow whatever I may have said or done to cloud the issue.”
Patrick McLoughlin, who backs Jeremy Hunt, today accused Boris of deepening Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s pain. He said: “I think some of the language that Boris has used has not helped her case.”
The Iranian regime has used Mr Johnson’s comment to justify dragging Nazanin through the courts for a second time and giving her a tougher sentence.
The jailed Brit recently went on hunger strike for two weeks, while husband Richard staged a one-man protest outside Iran’s embassy in London.
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