Published24. April 2024, 4:51 p.m.
Isfahan: Rapper Toomaj Salehi sentenced to death
Iranian justice imposed this sentence on him for his support for the 2022 protest movement.
The rapper’s imprisonment had provoked demonstrations here in France to demand his release.
IMAGO
An Iranian court has sentenced to death a famous Iranian rapper imprisoned for more than a year and a half for his support of the 2022 protest movement, local media reported on Wednesday.
“The revolutionary court of Isfahan (…) sentenced Toomaj Salehi to the death penalty for corruption on Earth”, one of the most serious charges in Iran, said the singer’s lawyer, Amir Raisian, quoted by the daily “Shargh”.
The revolutionary court had accused Mr. Salehi of “incitement to sedition, assembly, conspiracy, propaganda against the system and calling for riots,” according to the lawyer.
Arrested in October 2022
The 33-year-old rapper was arrested in October 2022. He had supported through his songs and on social networks the protest movement triggered after the death on September 16, 2022 of Mahsa Amini, a young Iranian Kurd detained by the morality police, who accused her of breaking the strict dress code for women.
Foreign artists then gave him their support, fearing that he would be sentenced to death.
Several hundred people, including members of the security forces, were killed and thousands arrested during protests held in October and November 2022 in Iran.
Nine people were executed in connection with this uprising, according to NGOs.
(AFP)