For the southern English couple Lindsay und Craig Foreman – two motorcycle enthusiasts in their 50s – it was supposed to be the trip of a lifetime. Ride the bikes from England to Australia. On her trip, Lindsay Foreman, a doctor of psychology, wanted to interview people from different regions: what it means to them to be human and to lead a good life.
The two finally set off in October 2024. They shared impressions of the trip on social media under #PPK2K. Spain, Italy, Albania, Turkey and Armenia they had already passed when they crossed the border into the Islamic Republic of Iran on December 31, 2024.
She pushed aside concerns from family and friends as well as guidelines from the British Foreign Office that advised against visiting Iran. They believed in goodness – everywhere. However, they had planned their five-day route across Iran in advance: they had booked the hotels, as well as Iranian travel companions and the visas. They posted online from Tabriz, Tehran and Isfahan. But on January 3, 2025, all contact with them suddenly ended. A whole month passed before it became clear what had happened.
Iranian authorities arrested Lindsay and Craig Foreman on espionage charges. More than a year later, they are still held in Iranian prisons.
A statement from a spokesman for the Iranian judiciary said at the time: They had entered Iran as tourists to collect information in numerous provinces. The two were said to have worked with hostile Western intelligence services.
Iran repeatedly arrests Western citizens
It is not the first time that British citizens have been imprisoned in Iran: Iranian-born Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was imprisoned in the notorious Evin prison complex between 2016 and 2022. The regime also accused her of espionage.
It was only through a prisoner exchange in which the British government gave the equivalent of almost half a billion euros to the Islamic Republic of Iran that Zaghari-Ratcliffe was released. And with her the British-Iranian businessman who was also imprisoned Anoosheh Ashoori. Iran – still under the control of the Shah, who was overthrown in 1979 – paid half a billion as part of a British-Iranian arms export deal. This was stopped after the Islamic Revolution.
Joe Bennett, whose mother and stepfather are imprisoned in Iran, during a vigil outside the gates of Downing Street, January 3, 2026
Photo:
James Willoughby/imago
Nazanin’s husband Richard Ratcliffe told the taz last summer that it was increasingly not just people with dual nationality – like his wife – who were at risk of becoming hostages. Ratcliffe emphasizes the word hostage. Western governments shy away from the term, he says. “However, it is nothing else.”
Also that one Austrian-Iranian businessman Kamran Ghaderiwho was imprisoned in Evin prison for years, told the taz: People with foreign nationality were deliberately being held as a means of blackmail.
Family makes demands on the British government
Joe Bennett, in his early thirties, is one of the couple’s four adult children. He demands that the British Foreign Office do more to release the two. Last summer he was able to talk to both his parents on the phone for the first time since his arrest. He was in England and the two spoke from Iranian prisons.
“It was a great relief, the first official sign of life with laughter and tears,” he tells the taz. “As far as we could tell, they sounded relatively well psychologically.”
He and his family are demanding more access to British consular embassy representatives for the two of them. Because so far there have only been a few such visits, says Bennett. “These are two experienced motorcycle tourers with a deep passion for exploring the world and getting to know new people and cultures. They have openly shared everything they do on social media, including before. They are not political people.”
The situation is being prolonged by hesitation, bureaucracy and the failure of the British government
Statement der Familie der Foremans
After the protests, the detention centers are even more overcrowded
Die current situation in Iran the family’s fears are exacerbated: The massive violence after the proteststhe miserable conditions in increasingly overcrowded prisons following the protests.
Joe Bennett says: He also doesn’t have a definitive answer to the question of how his parents could be released. More pressure must be put on both the Iranian and British leadership.
In a statement, the family wrote: “The situation is being prolonged by hesitation, bureaucracy and the failure of the British government to act decisively on behalf of its innocent citizens imprisoned in Iran.”
Listing of the Revolutionary Guards as a terrorist organization
The Iranian leadership is now coming under increased pressure from the EU: This is what the European Union foreign ministers said on Thursday agreed to list the powerful Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization. In addition, 15 other Iranians and six Iranian-related companies were placed under EU sanctions.
In Great Britain, the Revolutionary Guards are not yet listed as a terrorist group. According to information of the Telegraph Such a step could now also take place in Great Britain. Recently it was from the government still been rejected.
A spokesman for the British Foreign Office told the taz months ago that they were very concerned about reports of espionage charges against two British citizens. And continue to present the case to the Iranian authorities.
A spokeswoman for the family now said: They are deeply concerned about the “threats and counter-threats” that are currently being raised.
Collaboration: Lisa Schneider