There is no official confirmation or justification yet, but according to a lawyer, filmmaker and Berlinale winner Rassulof has been sentenced to prison in Iran. He is considered one of the country’s critical cultural figures.
Iranian filmmaker and Berlinale winner Mohammed Rassulof has reportedly been sentenced to several years in prison in Iran. As lawyer Babak Paknia wrote on the X platform, a court in the capital Tehran sentenced the 52-year-old to eight years in prison. In addition, the director should be punished with lashes.
According to the defense attorney, the judiciary justified the strict sentence with violations of national security. Rassulof will also have to pay a fine and confiscation of property was also mentioned. There was initially no confirmation of the verdict from the Iranian judiciary. Some Iranian media picked up the lawyer’s post.
Critical statements after High-rise building collapse
Rassulof, who received the Golden Bear at the Berlinale in 2020 for his film “There Is No Evil,” is considered an extremely critical filmmaker in Iran. Despite being banned from working for many years, he always managed to make films. He lived alternately in Tehran and Hamburg, but was banned from leaving the country by the Iranian regime just over a year ago.
Among other things, Rassulof was critical of the collapse of a high-rise building in the southwestern Iranian city of Abadan. More than 40 people died in May 2022. Numerous people then protested and demanded that those responsible be held accountable. The protests were violently suppressed by the security forces.