Two young men sentenced to ten years in prison for posting a video of them dancing without a veil in the center of Tehran

30 Jan. (EUROPA PRESS) –

An Iranian court has sentenced a young couple aged 21 and 22 to ten and a half years in prison for posting a video on social networks dancing in Azadi Square – Freedom Square – in downtown Tehran. She was not wearing a veil.

Section 15 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court considers Amir Ahmadi and his partner, Astiaj Haghighi, guilty of the crimes of “fomenting corruption” and “conspiring against national security and to spread propaganda” against the Islamic Republic, according to the Iranian news portal in exile IranWire.

For crime de danse, Astiyazh Haghighi, 21 years old, and Amir Mohammad Ahmadi, 22 years old, were sentenced to 10 years and 6 months in prison. @AlinejadMasih #MahsaAmini pic.twitter.com/iwtzEOsNdA

— L’important (@Limportant_fr) January 30, 2023

The ruling, dated January 29, further prohibits the defendants from having Internet activity and leaving Iran for two years after they serve their sentences.

Women are prohibited from dancing in the street and the case is even more serious for doing it with a man, even if it is, as in this case, her fiancé.

The two were detained on November 1 by plainclothes officers who beat them and took them to Section 209 of the Intelligence Ministry, according to critical Iranian media. Neither of them had the assistance of a lawyer during the trial, as they are entitled to by law, and their request for bail was rejected. The families of both would have been pressured by the authorities so that they did not talk about the case.

More than 500 people have been killed and 18,000 have been arrested in the latest wave of protests, which began in September as a result of the death of Iranian-Kurdish Mahsa Amini after being arrested for allegedly wearing the Islamic headscarf incorrectly. About twenty protesters have been sentenced to death since the start of the protests and four have already been executed.