Nasrin Roshan

Nasrin Roshan

Iranian-British Homemaker

Biography

Nasrin Roshan is a homemaker who was born in 1963 and who emigrated from Iran to the United Kingdom with her husband in the late 1980s or early 1990s.

First Arrest and Imprisonment

Roshan was first arrested in Iran in 1981 and was imprisoned until 1985. During that time, she was first tortured and interrogated in Iran’s notoriously brutal Evin Prison in Tehran and then transferred to Qazal Hesar Prison in Karaj, where she served the remainder of her time.

Second Arrest

The authorities arrested Roshan in November 2023 at the airport as she was trying to fly back to the U.K. after visiting a sick aunt. Until her arrest, Roshan told IranWire, she had visited Iran at least once or twice annually.

Treatment in Captivity

The regime held Roshan in solitary confinement in Ward 209 of Evin Prison for almost two months after she was taken hostage, and did not allow her to get in touch with her relatives for the first 40 days. Ward 209 is controlled by Iran’s intelligence ministry. According to Roshan, the first thing that her interrogators said to her after she was transferred to that ward was “Let’s see what the British government will give in exchange for you.”

After her release, Roshan described the mental torture her interrogators put her through:

The night they took me to [Ward] 209, blindfolded and in a chador, from the very entrance, terrible sounds of a man being beaten came. Heart-wrenching sounds of moaning and screaming. Then my interrogator told me, "Look, this is the fate of someone who doesn’t cooperate." To create fear and terror in my heart.

Maybe for this reason they tried to have polite behavior. Despite all this, they couldn’t stay away from their true nature. Several times we had severe verbal confrontations during interrogations. They threatened several times, saying "Don’t think it’s difficult—if you don’t cooperate, we’ll put a sack over your daughter’s and husband’s heads and bring them right next to you."

After almost two months, the authorities transferred Roshan in January 2024 to Evin’s women’s ward.

Roshan reportedly began to suffer from knee arthritis while imprisoned, affecting her ability to walk and her appearance. Her imprisonment also exacerbated her preexisting depression for years, according to Roshan’s husband, who also said that she was diagnosed with mitral valve prolapse, a heart disease.

Roshan’s jailors promised her that she would be allowed to speak to her daughter, who was getting married in Britain, via video call. However, when Roshan came to the office to make the call, prison officials told her she could not do so. This emotional abuse caused Roshan to have a nervous breakdown and fall unconscious for two days, during which time she was hospitalized. She was transferred back to prison after she awoke.

Trial, Conviction, and Sentencing

Roshan was tried and convicted by Iman Afshari, presiding judge of Branch 26 of Tehran’s Islamic Revolutionary Court, of “assembly and collusion” and “propaganda against the system.” Afshari sentenced her to four years’ imprisonment on the first charge and eight months on the second. Her sentence was later reduced to three years.

As grounds for Roshan’s prison sentences, Afshari reportedly cited her attendance of rallies against the Islamic Republic abroad following the September 2022 death of Mahsa Amini at the hands of Iran’s Morality Police. However, Roshan said another reason for her sentence that came up in her interrogations was that during a 2023 visit to Egypt, she had visited the grave of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi and taken a photo with his wife. Roshan stated that she had told the judge and her interrogator that the shah is part of Iranian history, a part that the regime cannot erase.

Roshan also criticized the judicial process she had received as a facade:

The court only has a symbolic form. It has no executive power; the final opinion and verdict is really in the interrogator’s hands. Whatever the interrogator writes, the judge implements. In my case, the interrogator had requested the maximum punishment for me. Mr. Afshari also said that "since you hired a lawyer, I’m forced to give you the maximum punishment. If you hadn’t gotten a lawyer, I would have helped you a lot." Really, they themselves can’t have opinions. The court is really just a ceremonial thing and has no meaning at all.

Roshan’s husband, Arash Asiabi, told the press that in the spring of 2024, a judge had summoned Roshan and stated to her that her sentence was being shortened to 13 months. However, when Roshan’s attorney tried to apply for early release for her in May 2024, the prosecutor informed him that Roshan’s sentence had not been reduced. “We realized . . . that they had duped us,” Asiabi said.

Release

After Roshan’s nervous breakdown and subsequent hospitalization, Evin’s supervising judge granted her request for a conditional release. She was freed on May 20, 2025, 550 days after her arrest.

International Reaction

Roshan’s husband told the press, “My wife has committed no crime and does not deserve to be in prison in Iran. My wife participated in protests outside Iran, just like any conscientious Iranian who cares about their country and people. Giving voice to the Iranian people is not a crime, and she should not spend a single day in prison.” Her husband also said that he had attempted to get the British government involved in Roshan’s case.

 

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