Has Jafar Panahi been released? Is Jafar Panahi out of prison?

Iranian filmmaker, Jafar Panahi has been released after several years of being under house arrest.

His wife Tahereh Saeedi posted a picture of them at an undisclosed airport with the caption that translates into English;

“After 14 years, Jafar’s ban was canceled and finally we are going to travel together for a few days.”

Some sources claim that they were at a French Airport. The post was made on Tuesday, April 25, 2023.

Panahi was sentenced and banned in a Tehran court, and placed on house arrest. Since then, he was not allowed to move freely on 15 October 2011.

A travel ban and filmmaking ban were imposed on him in 2009 by the government of the Islamic Republic for “making propaganda against the system.”

According to the authorities, Panahi was arrested because “he tried to make a documentary about the unrest that followed the disputed 2009 reelection of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.”

Panahi was arrested on March 1, 2010, along with his wife and daughter, but the women were released after a few days. He remained in section 209 inside Evin Prison until May 25, 2010, when he was released on $200,000 bail while awaiting trial.