Panahi, who won the top prize at the 2025 Cannes film festival, returned to Iran in March shortly after attending the 2026 Oscars ceremony in Los Angeles, despite facing legal cases and bitterly criticising the crackdown on protests in January.
An Iranian court has now sentenced Panahi to over five years in prison, his lawyer said last week, although the latest charges are unclear. In June, an Iranian court rejected an appeal against a one-year …