British-Iranian woman loses final appeal against five-year prison sentence

• Video report by ITV News Correspondent Paul Davies

A British-Iranian woman jailed in Iran for plotting to overthrow the government has lost her final appeal against her sentence, her family has said.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, 38, was detained at Tehran Airport while visiting family in Iran with her baby daughter, Gabriella, in April 2016.

The charity worker was jailed for five years last September and lost an earlier appeal in January, but maintains her innocence.

Her husband Richard Ratcliffe said the sentence at Iran's Supreme Court was upheld and has been told there are no more legal avenues available.

Speaking from the UK, Mr Ratcliffe said "the situation is now political" and vowed to continue putting pressure on the British Government.

He told reporters: "If we got to a year and she wasn't out I [said I] was going to start pushing again.

"We've had a year, the legal process is finished, so I think the Government needs to step up, find a way to visit her, say that she's innocent and call for her release publicly."

In a separate statement he added: "As her husband, I can say Nazanin is innocent until I am blue in the face. I have spent a year doing it. But it makes a clear difference that the government hasn't. It indulges the whispers."