Taraneh Alidoosti: Iran authorities arrest renowned actress for supporting demonstrators

Iran authorities have arrested a renowned actress, Taraneh Alidoosti, over her support of the man who was executed for his involvement with the anti-regime demonstrations.

Iran’s state-owned media reported that Ms Alidosti, the star of Oscar-winning movie, “The Salesman”, was arrested a week after she expressed solidarity with 23-year-old Mohsen Shekari who was executed over protests by the Iranian regime.

Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) reported that several other celebrities had been “summoned”  by Iran’s judiciary body “over publishing provocative content”. However, it did not mention how many people were summoned and did not also name the celebrities.

Ms Alidosti was charged with “spreading falsehoods” about the nationwide protests that have gripped Iran since the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in September.

According to the report published on IRNA’s official Telegram channel, Ms Alidoosti was arrested because she did not provide “any documents in line with her claims”.

The 38-year-old actress had posted about Shekari on her Instagram after he was executed by the regime. “His name was Mohsen Shekari. Every international organisation who is watching this bloodshed and not taking action, is a disgrace to humanity,” she said.

At the time of writing this report, her Instagram page that earlier had more than eight million followers, had been taken down.

In November this year, Ms Alidosti Iranian actor Taraneh Alidoosti posted an image of herself without a headscarf to show solidarity with anti-government demonstrations around the country.

She posted a photo on Instagram holding a sign translating to “Woman, Life, Freedom” in Kurdish. “Your last absence, the migration of birds of sound, is not the end of this absence,” the actress wrote in the caption.

Iran authorities have already executed two men who were initially held under protest-related charges and the capital offence of “Moharabeh” or “waging war against God”.

On 12 December, Majidreza Rahnvard was the second person to be executed by the Iranian regime.

Earlier this month, Amnesty International had warned that at least 28 people could face execution in Iran in connection with the protests, saying “authorities use the death penalty as a tool of political repression to end the popular uprising”.

Meanwhile, last week, in a significant move, the United Nations voted to remove Iran from a prominent women’s rights body for the remainder of its 2022-2026 term for the regime’s brutal crackdown on women-led protests against the theocracy. The move, proposed by the United States, to expel Iran from the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women was hailed by activists in Iran and all across the world.