Jafar Panahi Reported To Have Left Iran For First Time In 14 Years
26.04.2023 - 09:43
/ deadline.com
Dissident Iranian director Jafar Panahi is reported to have left Iran for the first time in 14 years following the lifting of a travel ban imposed on him in 2009.
Panahi’s wife Tahereh Saeedi posted a picture on Instagram on Tuesday night showing her arriving with her husband at an undisclosed airport.
It was cryptically captioned: “After 14 years, Jafar’s ban was cancelled and finally we are going to travel together for a few days…”
Panahi is seen waving and pushing a luggage trolley laden with three large suitcases.
A post shared by Tahereh saeedi (@taherehsaidii)
There is no information on where the picture was taken although there have been suggestions on social media that the backdrop is a French airport.
The The White Balloon, The Circle and Taxi director has spent most of his filmmaking career in the crosshairs of Iran’s authoritarian Islamic Republic government.
The director has not been able to leave Iran since 2009 after stoking its ire for attending the funeral of a student shot dead in the Green Revolution and his later attempt to shoot a feature set against the backdrop of the uprising.
In 2010, he was given a six-year suspended prison sentence as well as a 20-year filmmaking and travel ban In December 2010, for “making propaganda against the system”.
The reported trip comes two months after Panahi was released from Tehran’s notorious Evin jail following his arrest in July alongside Mohammad Rasoulof and filmmaker Mostafa Al-Ahmad amid a government crackdown on the country’s artists and freedom of expression.
Deadline has reached out to sources for confirmation of the report that Panahi has been allowed to travel internationally.
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