Oscar-nominated director Jafar Panahi says he will return to Iran despite being arrested
Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi says he plans to return to his native Iran after Oscar season is over, despite threats of arrest amid a government crackdown that has killed thousands following anti-government protests across the country.
The Oscar-nominated director, who was abroad promoting his latest film It was just an accident, was sentenced in absentia in December 2025 to one year in prison in Iran for “propaganda activities” against the country, according to reports.
“I have been out of Iran for some time because of the Oscar campaign for this film, but as I have said before, as soon as the campaign ends, I will return to Iran,” said Panahi on Thursday in an interview with Radio Atlantic.
Panahi’s lawyer, Mostafa Nili, while handing out the sentence, said it included a two-year ban on leaving Iran and a ban on membership in any political or social groups. He said they will file an appeal.
Panahi was one of 17 Iranian activists, artists, lawyers and journalists who signed a statement shared on X earlier this year expressing support for the widespread protests against Iran’s Islamic regime.
“The great public resistance movement of the people of Iran, by taking the streets, declares the national will to remove the illegitimate regime of the Islamic Republic,” read a statement shared on Jan. Narges Mohammadi, in 2023 Nobel Peace Prize the prize winner is currently imprisoned in Iran.
“We stand with the people to reclaim the right to a dignified life, freedom, justice, human dignity and sovereignty over our future,” said the statement.
(UGC/The Associated Press)
Panahi’s 2025 film It was just an accident, what was there filmed secretly in Iran without government permission, received two Oscars: best international film and best screenplay. The 98th Academy Awards will be held on March 15.
Last year, the film won i The Palme D’Or at the Cannes Film Festival. It also won best director, original screenplay and best international feature at Gotham Awards.
The story is inspired by Panahi’s experiences of being arrested twice for anti-government propaganda, and the experiences of those he met in Tehran’s Evin Prison.
17:53Jafar Panahi was inspired by Tehran’s political prisoners
Last year, Iranian director Jafar Panahi won the Palme d’Or at Cannes for his extraordinary film It Was Just an Accident, which he shot in secret in Tehran at great risk of serious injury. Jafar has been arrested twice on charges of “propaganda against the government” and protesting the arrest of other filmmakers. At the Toronto International Film Festival back in September, he joined Tom Power to tell us how It Was Just an Accident was made with two of his scenes in Tehran’s Evin Prison.
Panahi told CBC News in September that while filming It was just an accident in an Iran at risk of serious injury, he does not think of himself as a political filmmaker but as a “community-engaged filmmaker.”
Independent journalists Mehdi Mahmoudian, author of Panahi It was just an accident, again Vida Rabbani was among those arrested in Iran after signing the same letter.
Panahi told The Atlantic that she had been texting him Mahmoudian – whom he met while they were both incarcerated in 2022 – until shortly before Mahmoudian’s arrest on Jan. 31.
Panahi said Mahmoudian’s family heard about him a few days after he was arrested.
“He had one minute left to say he was safe and sound and under arrest, and then the phone was hung up.”
Both Mahmoudian and Rabbani are former political prisoners who have been repeatedly targeted by Iranian authorities for their work, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).
The Center for Human Rights in Iran said Rabbani launched a hunger strike on February 5 to protest the continued detention, in a statement on Tuesday.
Reports of recent prison abuses
On Wednesday, the Norwegian Nobel Committee called for an immediate and unconditional release Mohammadisaying he was “shocked by the detailed reliable reports [her] brutal imprisonment, physical abuse and continuous life-threatening ill-treatment.”
He said the committee received information that Mohammadi was beaten when he was arrested in December and continues to be ill-treated.
The statement comes after Iran sentenced the 53-year-old to more than seven years in prison. of “collecting and assembling,” in addition to 1½ years of spreading propaganda and a two-year travel ban, said Nili, who is also his lawyer.
The committee mentioned witness accounts and corroborated testimony from his family who said his guards “tunneled” around Mohammadi, beating him repeatedly with wooden sticks and clubs. They said he was dragged by the hair on the ground, “tearing off parts of his head and opening wounds.”
Eyewitness accounts reported that Mohammadi was repeatedly kicked in the genitals and groin, leaving him unable to sit or move without excruciating pain.
The children of imprisoned Iranian women’s rights activist Narges Mohammadi accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on her behalf on Sunday. They read a defiant letter that Mohammadi smuggled out of his cell, saying to continue resisting the regime.
“He continues to be denied rigorous medical treatment while being heavily investigated and threatened,” the committee chairman said. Jørgen Watne Frydnes said in a statement.
“She has fainted several times, has high blood pressure and has been prevented from following up on suspected breast tumors.”
Supporters had warned months before his arrest that he was at risk of being sent back to prison after being sentenced in December 2024 due to health issues.
The number of people who have died in protest continues to rise
The death toll from Iran’s nationwide protests last month has reached more than 7,000, with many more feared dead, activists said Thursday.
The continuing rise in the death toll adds to the heightened tensions facing Iran at home and abroad as it tries to negotiate with the United States over its nuclear program.
In its latest report on Thursday, the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) said at least 7,005 people have died, and another 11,730 cases are still being investigated. The agency was accurate, The Associated Press says, to count deaths during previous cycles of unrest in Iran and depend on the network of activists in Iran to confirm deaths.
HRANA says that the number of injured people was recorded at 25,845, and about 53,166 people were arrested.
A doctor describes treating patients in Iran as the regime cracks down on protests across the country, telling the CBC’s Margaret Evans the scenes were “horrifying” — details largely obscured by the country’s government-imposed internet shutdown. [Note: This video has been edited to remove information that could identify a confidential source.]
Of the total number of dead, HRANA said 6,506 were described as “protesters,” including 219 children under the age of 18.
HRANA said 214 of the dead were soldiers or government personnel, while 66 were recorded as non-protesters.
The rise in the death toll comes as the agency continues to gather information while communication remains difficult with those inside the Islamic Republic.
The Iranian government gave the death toll only on January 21, saying 3,117 people had been killed. Iran’s democratic regime has in the past not counted or reported the killings due to the riots.
