TEHRAN: Award-winning Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof, jailed half a year ago over protests related to a building collapse, has been released for two weeks because of health concerns, his lawyer said Wednesday.
Rasoulof, 50, was arrested on July 8 after being accused of encouraging demonstrations that erupted after the deadly collapse of a building in May in the southwestern city of Abadan.
After the tragedy, a group of Iranian filmmakers led by Rasoulof published an open letter decrying “corruption, theft, inefficiency and repression” and urging the security forces to “lay down their arms.”
“My client’s incarceration has been suspended for two weeks for health reasons,” the director’s lawyer Maryam Kianersi told AFP, adding that he had been “released on Saturday.”
The lawyer added that her client “is now discharged from hospital and is recovering at home.”
The release comes as Iran has been gripped by nearly four months of protests triggered by the death in custody of 22-year-old Iranian Kurd Mahsa Amini following her arrest for allegedly violating Iran’s strict dress code for women.
Iranian authorities say hundreds of people, including members of the security forces, have been killed and thousands arrested during the protests which they mostly describe as “riots.”
Rasoulof won the Golden Bear at the 2020 Berlin International Film Festival with his anti-death penalty film “There Is No Evil” but was unable to accept the award in person as he was barred from leaving Iran.
His passport had been confiscated after his 2017 film “A Man of Integrity” premiered at Cannes, where it won the top prize in the Un Certain Regard section of the festival.
On July 11, authorities arrested the internationally renowned dissident filmmaker Jafar Panahi upon his arrival at the Tehran prosecutor’s office to follow up on Rasoulof’s case.
Iranian filmmaker Rasoulof temporarily released: lawyer
https://arab.news/8snt6
Iranian filmmaker Rasoulof temporarily released: lawyer
- Rasoulof, 50, was arrested on July 8 after being accused of encouraging demonstrations
- "My client's incarceration has been suspended for two weeks for health reasons," said the director's lawyer
UN rights chief Shocked by ‘unbearable’ Darfur atrocities
- Mediation efforts have failed to produce a ceasefire, even after international outrage intensified last year with reports of mass killings, rape, and abductions during the RSF’s takeover of El-Fasher in Darfur
PORT SUDAN: Nearly three years of war have put the Sudanese people through “hell,” the UN’s rights chief said on Sunday, blasting the vast sums spent on advanced weaponry at the expense of humanitarian aid and the recruitment of child soldiers.
Since April 2023, Sudan has been gripped by a conflict between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces that has left tens of thousands of people dead and around 11 million displaced.
Speaking in Port Sudan during his first wartime visit, UN Human Rights commissioner Volker Turk said the population had endured “horror and hell,” calling it “despicable” that funds that “should be used to alleviate the suffering of the population” are instead spent on advanced weapons, particularly drones.
More than 21 million people are facing acute food insecurity, and two-thirds of Sudan’s population is in urgent need of humanitarian aid, according to the UN.
In addition to the world’s largest hunger and displacement crisis, Sudan is also facing “the increasing militarization of society by all parties to the conflict, including through the arming of civilians and recruitment and use of children,” Turk added.
He said he had heard testimony of “unbearable” atrocities from survivors of attacks in Darfur, and warned of similar crimes unfolding in the Kordofan region — the current epicenter of the fighting.
Testimony of these atrocities must be heard by “the commanders of this conflict and those who are arming, funding and profiting from this war,” he said.
Mediation efforts have failed to produce a ceasefire, even after international outrage intensified last year with reports of mass killings, rape, and abductions during the RSF’s takeover of El-Fasher in Darfur.
“We must ensure that the perpetrators of these horrific violations face justice regardless of the affiliation,” Turk said on Sunday, adding that repeated attacks on civilian infrastructure could constitute “war crimes.”
He called on both sides to “cease intolerable attacks against civilian objects that are indispensable to the civilian population, including markets, health facilities, schools and shelters.”
Turk again warned on Sunday that crimes similar to those seen in El-Fasher could recur in volatile Kordofan, where the RSF has advanced, besieging and attacking several key cities.
Hundreds of thousands face starvation across the region, where more than 65,000 people have been displaced since October, according to the latest UN figures.
