The husband of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has called on ministers to act “more promptly” than they did to help free his wife, after Iran detained a British couple on a motorcycle trip.

Richard Ratcliffe, whose wife was freed in 2022 after five years in a Tehran prison, expressed fears that the couple would now face the “brutal theatre” of court process to “get the government’s attention”.

“My heart goes out to them and I hope they are not in for a long ordeal, and that the government is able to respond more promptly than it did in our case,” said Ratcliffe, who went on hunger strike twice in a campaign for his wife’s release.

Craig and Lindsay Foreman, who are in their early 50s, were reportedly held in January after entering Iran for a five-day visit, part of a motorbike trip around the world.

The family spoke of their concern at the “distressing situation” facing the Foremans, who are being held in the southern city of Kerman. Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a British-Iranian dual national, was transferred to Kerman after her initial arrest.

The couple were heading for Australia, having crossed into Iran from Armenia on 30 December, according to social media posts. From Iran the couple had shared updates, including plans to enter Pakistan next.

This week state media published photographs purportedly showing the UK ambassador to Iran, Hugo Shorter, meeting the couple, whom the country has called “national security” suspects.

The published photo shows that a meeting on Wednesday was held in the presence of a Kerman prosecutor, Mehdi Bakhshi, and the Kerman governor’s deputy for security and law enforcement, Rahman Jalali.

The latest post on the Foremans’ Facebook page, from Isfahan in Iran on 3 January, includes selfies apparently showing the couple, with the caption: “What a wonderful place.”

A Foreign Office spokesperson said: “We are providing consular assistance to two British nationals detained in Iran and are in contact with the local authorities.”

The UK government advises that British and dual nationals are at significant risk of arrest, questioning or detention in Iran, and that a British passport or UK connections “can be reason enough” to be detained by Iranian authorities.

At least 66 foreign and dual nationals have been detained by Iran since 2010, according to research published by the University of Essex in 2022, as part of a growing practice of “politically motivated arrests” that has been decried by Human Rights Watch.

After the death in September 2022 of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish origin who had been arrested three days earlier for allegedly breaching the Islamic dress code for women, at least 40 foreign and dual nationals were arrested.

Ratcliffe said of the Foremans: “The top priority for the government should be to make sure they get to visit and that they are not being kept in solitary. It will be important they do not feel alone. A court process may soon come. It’s not a real court. But it will be a form of brutal theatre to get the government’s attention.”

Mehran Raoof, a dual national and labour rights activist, has been in prison in Iran since 2020 facing national security-related charges.