On Saturday 13 April 2024, Tehran-based cartoonist, painter and children's rights activist Atena Farghadani was violently arrested by security forces and taken to Evin prison for pasting one of her drawings on a wall.
His trial was delayed, but the sentence is now known, as can be read in different media.
This has been reported by the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI), a New York-based organisation:
"The cartoonist Atena Farghadani has been sentenced to six years in prison (five years mandatory if the conviction is upheld)*, two months after her arrest in front of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's residence and subsequent torture by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. She was tried in section 26 of the Islamic Revolutionary Court on charges of "insulting sacred values and propaganda against the state", her lawyer Mohammad Moghimi announced in X".
*(The sentence is five years for the first "offence" and one year for the second).
"Atena Farghadani has been persecuted for her courageous defiance of the Islamic Republic's repression," said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of CHRI. "The international community, especially the arts communities, must demand her immediate release."
According to his lawyer, under the pretext of multiple offences, the court has considered the most severe penalties for these two charges.
Artist advocacy organisations such as Artists at Risk Connection (ARC), PEN America, Cartooning for Peace, Cartoonists Rights and Freedom Cartoonists Foundation have already condemned the detention and ill-treatment of Atena Farghadani and demanded her immediate release.
Athena's "visits" to Evin prison and other prisons in Iran are frequent.
On 23 August 2014, she was arrested, interrogated and imprisoned on charges of"spreading propaganda against the system","insulting members of parliament through paintings" and"insulting the supreme leader" as well as her interrogators.
This was because of a satirical cartoon depicting a group of parliamentarians depicted as different animals. He then faced up to 12 years and 9 months in prison.
Eventually, the sentence was reduced to 18 months' imprisonment in the court of review and in May 2016 she was released.
In 2023 she was imprisoned again after refusing to accept bail.
Humour in trouble, a collection of cases
Cases of cartoonists who have had problems of some importance because of their cartoons or satirical illustrations. There are also some stories of other people who, without being cartoonists, have got into trouble for sharing them.
