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AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! I’m Amy Goodman.
As we continue to look at Iran, we turn to the recent arrest of Mehdi Mahmoudian in Tehran, the co-writer of the Oscar-nominated film It Was Just an Accident by the acclaimed dissident Iranian director Jafar Panahi. Mahmoudian was arrested after signing a public statement condemning Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. The statement also denounced the crackdown on anti-government protesters, saying, “The mass and systematic killing of citizens who bravely took to the streets to bring an end to an illegitimate regime constitutes an organized state crime against humanity.” Jafar Panahi also signed the statement.
I had a chance to speak to Panahi while we were both at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival over the weekend. I started by congratulating him on his two Oscar nominations, for Best Original Screenplay and Best International Feature, and asked him what the nominations mean to him.
JAFAR PANAHI: [translated] With everything that’s going on in Iran when this news broke, everyone was in such shock that we couldn’t really think about the nominations. There had been a gruesome massacre. I had forgotten everything, and I was only in shock of what had happened. I was grieving.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about the news that your co-writer for It Was Just an Accident has been arrested in Iran, that Mehdi Mahmoudian has been arrested?
JAFAR PANAHI: [translated] Following the massacre, 17 of us published a statement. And in that statement, we held Ayatollah Khamenei responsible for what had happened. Mehdi Mahmoudian was also one of the co-signers of that statement, and it was because of that that they arrested him. Yesterday, they arrested one more person out of those 17 people, and a few of those co-signers are now in prison.
I first met Mehdi in prison. Because he had spent nine years of his life in prison, I knew that he had a deep understanding of different people in the society, and for that reason, I invited him to this film to help with writing the dialogues, because he knew the different characters of this film very well.
Mehdi Mahmoudian was arrested at the same time as Abdollah Momeni, as Vida Rabbani. And now we know that they’re kept in very bad conditions. Mehdi and Abdollah Momeni are in cells of 17 meters by 17 meters, in which 30 prisoners are held. Those 30 prisoners are common prisoners held for crimes such as drug trafficking and murder and other crimes.
And Ms. Vida Rabbani did not accept to wear the veil from the very beginning during the interrogations and during the detaining process. Therefore, they held her from her hair, and they pulled her and they treated her very violently.
AMY GOODMAN: How did you learn of your co-screenwriter Mehdi’s arrest?
JAFAR PANAHI: [translated] I was in touch with him almost every day, and we were messaging. But the last message I sent him, around 3:30 a.m., was not even seen. And I started to worry a few hours later, and I started inquiring about him through friends. But then, around 4 or 5 p.m. Iran time, I heard from BBC Persian that he was arrested.
AMY GOODMAN: How many times has he been arrested?
JAFAR PANAHI: [translated] He has been in prison for almost nine-and-a-half years, and he has been arrested for eight times. Now we don’t know how much prison sentence he’s going to serve and how long he’s going to be there.
AMY GOODMAN: And when you say you met him in prison, when you were in prison, as well?
JAFAR PANAHI: [translated] Yes. When I first entered prison, he came and introduced himself and talked to me, and he was very kind to me. And then I saw that any prisoner, every prisoner who enters, Mehdi does the same thing. He comes, he introduces himself, and he tries to help the prisoner not feel lonely upon entrance. And he would try to meet all the needs and necessities of that prisoner, regardless of what school of thought they belonged to, what group they identified with, etc.
AMY GOODMAN: The acclaimed dissident Iranian director Jafar Panahi, director of the Oscar-nominated film, It Was Just an Accident. He was interpreted by Sheida Dayani. To see our interviews with Jafar Panahi, go to democracynow.org.
