Jafar Panahi, the award-winning director, was present on Tuesday at the funeral of Hamid Ali-Dousti, the former national team footballer of Iran, in Tehran. This marks Panahi's first public appearance after his return to Iran earlier this year.
Panahi's Return to Iran
Jafar Panahi, who won the Best Film award at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, returned to Iran in March after attending the 2026 Oscars in Los Angeles. His return came amid legal challenges, and he had expressed strong criticisms regarding the suppression of protests in January.
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According to Panahi's lawyer, an Iranian court has sentenced him to over five years in prison, although the recent charges are still not clearly defined. In June, his appeal against a one-year prison sentence was rejected. However, upon entering Iran, he appeared to still be at liberty.
Attendance at the Funeral
Panahi was clearly present at the funeral of Hamid Ali-Dousti, the former footballer. Images released by domestic news agencies and Persian-language media outside Iran show him sitting next to Peyman Maadi, one of Iran's prominent actors, wearing dark glasses.
At the ceremony, the daughter of the deceased footballer, Taraneh Ali-Dousti, a well-known actress in the country, was also present. She attracted attention for not adhering to Islamic hijab, which is still mandatory in the Islamic Republic of Iran. Foreign media published images of her sitting next to Ali Daei, the former national team striker of Iran, and later carrying her father's coffin along with other men.
Taraneh Ali-Dousti was a staunch supporter of the nationwide protests against the authorities in 2022 and had shared a picture of herself without a headscarf on social media at that time. She is recognized as a champion among supporters of this movement and had spent nearly three weeks in prison, announcing that she would halt her artistic activities to support the families of those killed in the suppression of protests.
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