Iran frees rapper Toomaj Salehi, whose lyrics about Mahsa Amini initially saw him sentenced to death

Iranian rapper and activist Toomaj Salehi has been launched from jail greater than two years after his lyrics and assist of large ladies’s rights demonstrations that swept the nation following the demise in police custody of Mahsa Amini noticed him jailed and finally sentenced to demise, attorneys representing him mentioned in an announcement Monday. 

Salehi’s worldwide authorized group on the British agency Doughty Road Chambers welcomed his launched, which was additionally reported by Iran’s state-run media, in a statement posted on their web site, saying Salehi was “launched from jail in a single day by Iranian authorities.”

“Our courageous, good consumer Toomaj Salehi is lastly free, after 753 days’ imprisonment,” Caoilfhionn Gallagher, worldwide authorized counsel for Salehi’s household, mentioned within the assertion from the agency.  

“Mr Salehi has lengthy used his highly effective artwork — his rapping, his music, his phrases — to assist the ‘Lady, Life, Freedom’ motion and human rights in Iran. For this, the Iranian authorities have focused him for years, trying to silence him by arrests, imprisonment, torture, assaults, and even a demise sentence,” Gallagher mentioned, including: “The world should not look away now: we should guarantee Mr Salehi stays free and is rarely once more subjected to the egregious violations of his rights which he has endured over the previous 753 days,” she added. 

Salehi posted a photograph on his Instagram account to thank well-wishers for his or her assist, saying: “For the previous two years, you could have completed for me unpredictable, magnificent and unbelievable issues, I’m part of you right now.” 

The 33-year-old rapper was arrested in October 2022 after publicly backing the protests that erupted within the aftermath of Amini’s demise. An Iranian Kurd, Amini died in police custody after being detained over an alleged breach of the hardline Islamic republic’s strict guidelines on ladies’s apparel.

Salehi joined different protesters on the streets and wrote a tune condemning the Iranian regime for Amini’s demise. 

“Somebody’s crime was dancing along with her hair within the wind. Somebody’s crime was that she or he was courageous and outspoken,” he mentioned in his tune “Fal,” which was launched shortly earlier than his arrest. 

In June, Iran’s Supreme Court docket overturned a demise sentence that had been handed to Salehi by one other Iranian court docket on a cost of “corruption on Earth.”

Iranian courts usually hear circumstances fully behind closed doorways, with proof produced in secret and restricted rights given to these on trial. The demise sentence drew large worldwide condemnation.

Iran’s state-run media, together with the Mizan outlet managed by the nation’s judiciary, extensively reported Salehi’s launch. Mizan mentioned he was freed Sunday after serving a one-year sentence on a cost of appearing in opposition to the federal government, however different fees in opposition to the rapper have been nonetheless pending, and state media shops didn’t say whether or not he might face new trials on different counts.