Iran’s Tehran Court of Appeal has reduced the six years jail sentence for Kurdish filmmaker Keywan (Keyvan) Karimi to only one-year in prison and 223 lashes on charges of “propaganda against the system”, a reliable source told Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN).
His lawyer has been informed on 20 February 2016 that the Branch 54 of the Tehran Court of Appeal had reduced the sentence to only one-year in prison, 223 lashes and 20 million Iranian Rials, the source said.
He appeared before the Tehran Court of Appeal headed by judges known only as Babiyee and Pour-Arab on 23 December 2015, which was attended by representatives of the state’s Intelligence Agency and Tehran Public Prosecutor, too.
The KHRN source said that Karimi wanted to serve the sentence and that his only concern was trying to delay serving the sentence to after the Persian and Kurdish Newroz New year, which is when his mother is scheduled to receive her last chemotherapy treatment, and it is also when he is set to finish shooting his latest film.
He was arrested on 14 December 2013 shortly after a Youtube trailer of his 2012 film Neveshtan Rooye Shahr (Writing on the City) about graffiti on Tehran streets had gone online.
He was released on bail 12 days after being jailed in a solitary confinement cell in Tehran’s Evin Prison.
The Islamic Revolutionary Court of Tehran first sentenced him to six years in prison and 223 lashes on 13 October 2015.
