Iran sentences filmmaker Jafar Panahi in absentia to five years in prison

A verdict in absentia

A Revolutionary Court in Tehran convicted Jafar Panahi in absentia and sentenced him to five years and one month in prison, his lawyer Mostafa Nili told the reformist newspaper Etemad. The court also ordered the confiscation of all his movable and immovable property, barred him from leaving Iran and from using social media for two years, and froze his bank accounts. According to Nili, the verdict came from Branch 26 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court, and it was reported on Tuesday, 27 October 2026. Isna, the semi-official news agency, also carried the lawyer's account.

Notification and location

Nili said his client was never notified of a hearing in the case behind the new sentence. He said the accounts had been frozen shortly before the verdict became known, and that the legal team only learned of the sentence after visiting the enforcement unit of the Prosecutor's Office for Culture and Media. The file places Panahi outside Iran and says authorities could not locate him, even though he returned to the country on 30 March, according to Nili. One report gives 10 April as the return date, during hostilities in the Iran war. Nili also said an arrest order was issued against Panahi on 20 May by Branch 16 of the Prosecutor's Office for Culture and Media, the same day Panahi was present at Branch 26 of the Revolutionary Court for a separate case. He appeared before the judiciary in September in another proceeding, and he now faces three open cases.

A record of earlier sentences

Panahi has been detained and imprisoned several times. In 2020 he was sentenced to six years in prison and 20 years without the right to make films, write scripts or travel abroad. He entered Evin prison in July 2022 to serve that term and was freed in February 2023 after about seven months behind bars. LaVanguardia reports a separate one-year sentence in December 2025 for activities of propaganda against the system. HRANA, a Persian-language rights news agency, says that earlier sentence also came with two years of travel and social media bans. Mizan Online, the judiciary's news agency that authorities usually use to publicise convictions, has not carried the new sentence.

Cannes success and international profile

Panahi is one of Iran's best-known directors. He won the Camera d'Or at Cannes in 1995 for The White Balloon, the Golden Lion in Venice in 2000 for The Circle, and the Golden Bear in Berlin in 2015 for Taxi. In May 2025 he left Iran for the first time in 15 years to present his film Un simple accidente at Cannes, where it won the Palme d'Or. The film was nominated for two Oscars in 2026. The new sentence comes after that international tour and his return to Iran in the spring.