The filmmaker Jafar Panahi, sentenced to 5 years and one month in prison by the Iran regime

BarcelonaA new chapter in the long and tortuous history of the Iranian regime's repression of filmmaker Jafar Panahi. The 26th branch of the Tehran Revolutionary Court has sentenced the director of A Simple Accident to five years and one month in prison and has ordered the seizure of his assets, according to Variety, which cites the Iranian news agency Emtedad. It is unclear what charges the filmmaker is accused of. The court has also banned Panahi from using social media for two years. This is the first final sentence for Panahi since he won the Cannes Palme d'Or in 2025 for A Simple Accident, which was also nominated for two Oscars.

According to Mostafa Nili, Panahi's lawyer, the director's accounts were frozen last week, and when he and his client asked the Prosecutor's Office for explanations, they learned that Panahi had been convicted in absentia: the ruling states that the director was out of the country, although, according to Nili, Panahi returned to Iran on March 30, shortly after the 2026 Oscars ceremony. Nili claims that the trial was held without previously informing his client. Panahi's lawyer asserts that the director still has three open legal proceedings, and that in September he appeared before the authorities upon judicial request. According to Nili, in fact, the Culture and Media Prosecutor's Office issued an arrest warrant for Panahi on May 20, the same day the director was in the 26th branch of the Revolutionary Court for a hearing related to another case.

Over the last two decades, Panahi's career has been marked by his legal problems with the Iranian regime, which has subjected him to relentless ideological persecution. Despite being the most important Iranian filmmaker of his generation, acclaimed at prestigious festivals like Cannes, Venice, and Berlin, Panahi has seen the regime forbid him from making films, writing scripts, or traveling abroad. He has also been under house arrest and even imprisoned. The last time he was in prison, in 2023, he declared a hunger strike to denounce his unjust imprisonment and the "illegal and inhumane" treatment he received from the security forces. That protest and international support for Panahi finally led to the director's release, which he took advantage of to clandestinely film A Simple Accident.

Jafar Panahi:

Jafar Panahi: “If I don't make films, the Islamic regime wins, and I am not willing to let that happen”