Ana Diamond

Diamond moved to Finland when she was a toddler and went to Ressu International Baccalaureate School in Helsinki. She later moved to United Kingdom and grew up in London. She studied Film Studies and Theology at King's College London, graduating with First-Class Honours in 2019.[6] She holds British, Iranian, and Finnish citizenships.[2][3]

Diamond travelled to the United States as part of the University of California Education Abroad Program and studied a semester at University of California, Santa Barbara before going on a pilgrimage to Israel in July 2014. She documented the peaceful co-existence of the Jewish, Christian and Muslim people in the Old City, Jerusalem, which was one of the alleged evidences later used by Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to prove her "spy work" for MI6 and Mossad.[2]

On 10 January 2016 she was formally arrested with her parents after approximately 500-days of a travel ban and extensive interrogations by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps during which they were not allowed to leave Iran. Diamond spent roughly 200 days in solitary confinement in 2-Alef IRGC security ward in Evin Prison.[7] Diamond was briefly transferred to the public ward with other female political prisoners, including Narges Mohammadi and Atena Farghadani. At the time, Diamond was the youngest female inmate in Evin Prison and one of the few dual-nationals to undergo a forced virginity test during detention, as well as a mock execution.[8] Diamond has described her treatment as "demeaning" and as "torture".[3]

Unlike other political and national security prisoners, Diamond was tried at the Special Clerical Court due to her high-profile family clerical background. Her prosecutor was Ebrahim Raisi, later a presidential candidate in 2017 Iranian presidential election running against President Hassan Rouhani. Diamond was charged with espionage for "enemy governments, including MI6, CIA, Mossad, and others" and blasphemy. Her earlier involvement in UK youth politics as a spokeswoman for Conservative Future and her photos with various high-profile politicians, including Boris Johnson and Janet Napolitano, were used to present her as a special adviser for the Conservative Party and as an MI6 and CIA spy. At the end of the trial, she was found guilty and was sentenced to death.[3]

In August 2016, Diamond was released on bail in excess of about $130,000. She was placed on house arrest and sentenced to a 10-year jail term, which was later revoked and all charges against her dropped in 2017. She left Iran with an emergency passport in May 2018 and returned to London.[9]

Since her return to the UK, Diamond has been open about the psychological trauma inflicted on her and the physical damages that she developed during her detention, one of them being a severe cardiac arrhythmia.[10] She underwent two heart operations in London within a year after her return and has since then become one of the founding members of The Families Alliance Against State Hostage Taking, alongside Richard Ratcliffe, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe's husband, Jason Rezaian, and Nizar Zakka. The Families Alliance was launched at the 74th United Nations General Assembly in New York City in 2019.[1]

• List of foreign nationals detained in Iran