List of foreign nationals detained in Iran

The Islamic Republic of Iran has, since its early years and the Iran hostage crisis, engaged it repeated dubious detention of foreign or dual nationals. This occurred for extended period, with long documented history of using the detained party as a bargaining piece in larger diplomatic negotiations. The list below of current and former detainees in Iran excludes people abducted in other countries and brought into the country.

Hostage diplomacy
Since the Iran hostage crisis, the Islamic Republic of Iran has engaged in a pattern of detaining foreign nationals for extended periods. According to the Center for Human Rights in Iran, the Iranian government has used imprisoned dual and foreign-only nationals "as bargaining chips in its dealings with other nations." Iran's repeated dubious detention of dual citizen and thereafter bargaining behavior have lead observers to qualify the practice as a case of hostage diplomacy, with a long documented history.

Detainees
Dual nationals of Iran and another country are particularly vulnerable to arbitrary detention because the international Master Nationality Rule provides that "a State may not afford diplomatic protection to one of its nationals against a state whose nationality such person also possesses".

According to Human Rights Watch, "Iranian authorities have violated detainees' due process rights and carried out a pattern of politically motivated arrests." In November 2017, Reuters reported that Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) had arrested "at least 30 dual nationals during the past two years, mostly on spying charges."

Reactions
In September 2019, on the sidelines of the Seventy-fourth session of the United Nations General Assembly, families of dual and foreign nationals imprisoned in Iran as well former dual and foreign nationals imprisoned in Iran launched the "Alliance of Families Against State Hostage Taking."

In January 2023, France called for the release of seven nationals, who were held in Iran. One of the detainees, Fariba Adelkhak was arrested in June 2019, along with her colleague Roland Marchal. While Marchal was released in 2020, but Fraiban Adelkhak remained in prison amid mounting political tensions in Iran.