Iran sentences rapper Toomaj Salehi to death over 2022-23 unrest
An Iranian revolutionary court has sentenced one of the Islamic Republic's best known rappers, Toomaj Salehi, to death for charges linked to Iran’s 2022-23 unrest, according to his lawyer and state media.
An Iranian revolutionary court has sentenced one of the Islamic Republic's best known rappers, Toomaj Salehi, to death for charges linked to Iran’s 2022-23 unrest, according to his lawyer and state media.
Salehi in his songs supported months of protests in Iran in 2022 sparked by the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish Iranian woman arrested for allegedly wearing an “improper” hijab.
Salehi was initially arrested in October 2022 after making public statements in support of the nationwide protests.
He was sentenced in 2023 to six years and three months in prison, but avoided a death sentence due to a Supreme Court ruling.
“Branch One of the Revolutionary Court of (the central city of) Isfahan in an unprecedented move, did not enforce the Supreme Court’s ruling .... and sentenced Salehi to the harshest punishment,” his lawyer Amir Raisian told Sharq.
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