Parastoo Ahmadi, the 29-year-old Iranian artiste, and eight members of her production crew have reportedly received sentences of 74 lashes each following a livestreamed concert that defied the country’s mandatory dress codes.
According to legal documents reviewed by human rights organisations, Ahmadi and her fellow performers, which included several instrumentalists, were convicted by a criminal court in Qom province on charges related to producing and distributing content deemed “vulgar and immoral” through online platforms.
In addition to the corporal punishment, the court imposed two-year travel restrictions and barred the artistes from any future creative work during the same period.
The December 2024 performance featured Ahmadi singing ‘Az Khoone Javaneane Vatan,’ a ballad with deeply patriotic undertones while appearing without the legally required headscarf.
The broadcast, streamed through her YouTube channel, quickly amassed millions of views before authorities intervened.
Though Iran’s official judiciary news agency has not formally published the verdict, legal experts and advocacy groups who have examined the court documents confirm the sentences, according to The Guardian UK.
Ahmadi and several band members were temporarily detained following the video’s release but were later freed pending formal charges.
Bahar Ghandehari, advocacy director at the Center for Human Rights in Iran, characterised the punishment as disproportionate to the alleged offense.
“Ahmadi’s punishment of 74 lashes for merely singing and appearing without a hijab is yet another reminder that human rights conditions in Iran have not changed, despite the Iranian authorities’ wartime propaganda campaign aimed at improving their image,” she said.
Moein Khazaeli, a human rights lawyer at Dadban, a legal counselling centre for Iranian activists, also questioned the legal foundation of the conviction.
“Singing, performing music and producing or disseminating musical works by women are not criminalised under Iranian criminal law. Consequently, such activities cannot reasonably be construed as the ‘production, distribution or publication of obscene content’,” he said.
“The imposition of a flogging sentence against artists, civil society activists or other citizens is not merely a matter of domestic criminal law. It also raises serious concerns regarding states’ international obligations to prohibit torture and safeguard human dignity.
“For this reason, numerous human rights organisations consider flogging not a legitimate form of punishment, but rather a form of torture and inhuman treatment.”
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