British couple sentenced to 10 years in Iran's Evin Prison amid war fears

Lindsay Foreman described Tehran's Evin Prison as "an endurance test for the mind" in a rare telephone interview hours before an Iranian court handed her and her husband Craig a ten-year sentence for espionage, a charge the Sussex couple, both in their 50s, categorically deny.

The Tehran Revolutionary Court issued the sentence on 19 February 2026, more than a year after the pair were detained on 3 January 2025. They had crossed into Iran from Armenia on 30 December 2024 as part of a round-the-world motorcycle trip, carrying Iranian visas, a licensed guide and an approved itinerary. Iranian authorities arrested them days later regardless.

The conditions they face inside Evin, a facility human rights organisations describe as the country's harshest and notorious for the abuse and torture of inmates, have deteriorated sharply in recent weeks. Their son, Joe Bennett, said the situation had become critical. "Food is scarce. We're worried about the replenishment of their stocks of food. I mean, it's unsanitary conditions. It has been described as 'hell on Earth' by them," he said. "Conditions have intensified over the last couple of weeks, to say the least, as you might imagine with the complexity of war. With the bombs that are dropping and the activity that's happening there at the moment, the anxiety is heightened for us and for them as well."

Speaking from Evin before sentencing, Lindsay told BBC Radio 4: "I'm surrounded by people who are in worse situations who have to live this their entire life, so in some way I feel lucky that I've had the life I have until this point, and hopefully one day for me it will end."

The couple were initially held in custody in Kerman, in central Iran, before Craig was transferred to Evin in August 2025. The prison is already severely overcrowded, with cells reportedly housing fifty or more prisoners, conditions made worse by extreme heat and metal bunks that cause chronic back pain.

Bennett described the sentencing as "gut-wrenching" and said no evidence of spying had ever been presented by Iranian authorities. He has written to Prime Minister Keir Starmer and the foreign secretary; those letters, he said, went unanswered. Speaking at the McCain Institute's US-UK Transatlantic Conference on Hostage-Taking and Arbitrary Detention in Washington, Bennett called the prime minister's advocacy "non-existent" and appealed directly to President Donald Trump for support.

The family's sense of abandonment echoes a pattern that human rights groups have long documented: Iran has detained dozens of dual nationals and foreign residents in recent years, at least fifteen of them with links to the UK, mostly on national security and espionage charges. Rights organisations say such prisoners are routinely held for leverage and released only when Tehran receives something in return.

Precedent exists for a diplomatic resolution. British-Iranian citizens Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori were released in 2022 after the UK settled a £650 million debt owed to Iran. French and German nationals have similarly been freed following sustained government pressure.

No evidence of spying has been made public, and the UK Foreign Office has not confirmed what, if any, steps it is taking to secure the Foremans' release. Bennett has called on the government to "act decisively and use every available avenue" to bring his parents home.