IT’S the equivalent of a high-powered game of geopolitical chess in which all too often innocent individuals are played and sacrificed like pawns.
Most of us are probably unaware of the extent to which it exists and only when the plight of a high-profile victim appears in the news headlines does it catch our eye.
Such is the case of British Iranian dual national Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe who this week was sentenced by a revolutionary court to a further year in an Iranian prison on top of the five she has already spent incarcerated accused of spying.
Her latest additional sentence which also includes a one-year travel ban comes after the charity worker was found guilty of spreading propaganda against the Iranian regime after attending a demonstration outside the Iranian embassy in London back in 2009.