“Taxi Tehran” director Jafar Panahi released on bail in Iran Harassment of rescued migrants: Italy’s policy violates human rights

According to a newspaper report, award-winning Iranian film director Jafar Panahi has been released on bail after about seven months in prison. The Iranian newspaper Shargh reported this on Twitter on Friday. On Wednesday evening, citing Panahi’s family, filmmakers announced that the 62-year-old had gone on hunger strike. Since July 2022, Panahi has been held in the notorious Ewin Prison in the Iranian capital Tehran.

According to a statement, the Berlinale’s management duo, Mariette Rissenbeek and Carlo Chatrian, said: “We were very concerned about Jafar Panahi’s health and are now very happy that he has finally been released.” Former Berlinale director Dieter Kosslick was also relieved. He told 3sat magazine “Kulturzeit”: “I think he will remain free for now. I hear he is doing well under the circumstances.”

Panahi, who also takes a critical look at the politics of the Islamic Republic in his films, is one of the country’s most internationally renowned directors. For his latest film “No Bears” he received a special prize from the jury at the Venice Film Festival in his absence. He has received many other awards throughout his career, such as the top prize at the Berlinale in 2015 for “Taxi Tehran”. According to the Iranian judiciary, the director was in prison for “anti-government propaganda”, and the prison sentence should therefore be a total of six years.

Several well-known filmmakers and directors are imprisoned in Iran. Among them is the Berlinale winner Mohammed Rassulof. The most recent demonstrations also arrested actresses who had expressed solidarity with the wave of protests led by women. Rassulof and Panahi were critical of the collapse of a shopping arcade under construction last summer.

The latest wave of protests in Iran was triggered by the death of Iranian Kurd Jina Mahsa Amini in police custody in mid-September. She had been arrested by the so-called vice police for violating Islamic dress codes. Street protests have subsided in recent weeks. Many women now express their displeasure through civil disobedience, for example by ignoring the mandatory headscarf. (sda/dpa)