This article was originally published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is reprinted with permission.
Iranian cartoonist Atena Farghadani has been sentenced to six years in prison by the country’s Islamic Revolutionary Court, her attorney said.
Mohammad Moqimi told RFE/RL’s Radio Farda that Farghadani received five years for “insulting sacred beliefs” and an additional year for “propaganda” against the Islamic republic for her activism.
The sentences were officially communicated to the artist on June 10 following her conviction by Branch 26 of the Islamic Revolutionary Court, Moqimi said.
He highlighted that the court imposed the harshest penalties available under the charges, citing the number of infractions she was alleged to have committed.
It isn’t Farghadani’s first encounter with the Iranian justice system.
Last year, she was taken into custody after visiting the Evin prosecutor’s office and was detained by security forces.
She has already served 18 months for charges including “assembly and collusion,” “propaganda activities against the state,” and “insulting the leadership and the president.”
Farghadani’s latest arrest occurred on April 14, after which Moqimi reported that she was severely beaten, leaving an interrogation with visible injuries on her face.
Refusing to accept the bail set for her detention, which she said was “arbitrary,” Farghadani was transferred to Qarchak prison near Tehran, known for its harsh conditions.
An art graduate from Alzahra University, Farghadani was recognized internationally when the Cartoonists Rights Network International awarded her its Courage In Cartooning Award in August 2015.
The sentence is part of a broad campaign of suppression in response to the Women, Life, Freedom protests in 2022, during which many artists and popular cultural activists have been similarly targeted.
Javaid Rehman, the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, concluded in a report in March that the actions of the Iranian authorities since the 2022 protests pointed to “the possible commission of international crimes, notably the crimes against humanity of murder, imprisonment, enforced disappearances, torture, rape and sexual violence, and persecution.”
