‘KIDNAPPING’

Celebrated Iranian Director Ordered to Serve 6 Years in Prison

The “Taxi” director was arrested after going to a notorious prison to ask about the well-being of two other recently detained filmmakers.

Celebrated Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi has been ordered to spend six years behind bars after being detained in Tehran last week. Panahi, known for his work on 2015’s Taxi and 2011’s This Is Not a Film, is the third director arrested by Iranian authorities in less than a week. In fact, Panahi was taken into custody during a visit to Evin prison to ask about the well-being of the other two imprisoned filmmakers, Mohammad Rasoulof and Mostafa Al-e Ahmad. “Jafar has some rights as a citizen,” Panahi’s wife told BBC Persian. “There’s due process. To imprison someone, the person needs to be summoned first. But to imprison someone who is protesting outside the jail raises a lot of questions. This is a kidnapping.” A spokesperson for the Iranian judiciary said that Panahi, 62, needed to complete the six-year sentence he was handed in 2010 for “propaganda against the system” after supporting political protests in the wake of a controversial presidential election. Panahi only served two months before being released, according to an AFP news agency report at the time.