Protests in Iran: Oscar-winning actress Taraneh Alidoosti arrested

The Iranian actress who starred in the Oscar-winning film 'The Salesman', Taraneh Alidoosti, has been arrested in connection with the anti-government protests in Iran.

According to state media, Taraneh Alidoosti has been accused of spreading falsehoods about the nationwide protests. If found guilty the actress could be facing a long prison sentence.

According to the Austrian newspaper Kronen Zeitung, her colleagues reported that strangers broke into Alidoosti's house, confiscated the laptop and other documents, and arrested the actress in front of her daughter.

The Austrian news outlet also reported that the actresses' father, ex-soccer player Hamid Alidoosti, is trying to find out which authority issued the arrest warrant and where she is being held.

The actress has repeatedly shown solidarity with the protest movement in her country on social media.

Pictured: Taraneh Alidoosti at a press conference in Cannes 2022.

The protests began in September 2022 after the young Kurd Mahsa Amini died in custody of the vice squad. Amini was arrested for improperly wearing her headscarf.

When the young protester Mohsen Shekari was publicly executed in Iran in early December 2022, Taraneh Alidoosti wrote on Instagram: "Any international organization that watches this bloodbath and does not react is a disgrace to humanity."

On her Instagram page, she posted a picture of herself without a hijab and with a piece of paper with the main slogan of the protests written on it: "Women, Life, Freedom".

The Hollywood Reporter reports that her Instagram account, which has around 8 million followers , has been blocked.

According to a report by IRNA (Islamic Republic News Agency) quoted by The Hollywood Reporter, Alidoosti was arrested for failing to "provide documents in line with her claims."

Taraneh Alidoosti is an internationally known actress. In May 2022 she was at the Cannes Film Festival with her latest film 'Leila's Brothers', accompanied by director Ashgar Farhadi and actor Shahab Hosseini. Now the public showing of the film in Iranian cinemas has been banned.

The system-critical protests have been going on since mid-September. Human rights activists in Iran estimate that around 18,200 people have been arrested since then.

There have been solidarity demonstrations in Germany (pictured) and many other countries. The EU reacted with sanctions. But nothing has changed.

Amnesty International reports that at least 26 people are at risk of execution in connection with the protests, including three minors. Iran executed more than 250 people in 2022 alone.

Because of the violence against demonstrators, a United Nations body decided to exclude Iran from the UN Commission on the Status of Women.

Pictured: Before the vote, Iranian women protest in front of the United Nations headquarters for women's rights.

Ebrahim Raisi (pictured) has been the President of Iran since August 2021. In the election, with a historically low turnout (48.8 percent), the ultra-conservative cleric, affiliated with the Association of Fighting Clerics, got 62 percent of the valid votes.

The US government had already imposed personal sanctions on Raisi in 2019, before he took office, for alleged human rights violations. The former deputy prosecutor at the Revolutionary Court in Tehran, he is believed to be associated with the 1988 mass executions of Marxists and other leftists.

Taraneh Alidoosti was born on January 12, 1984 in Tehran. Before she dared to publicly criticize the regime, she was a celebrated star in her country and received several awards at Iran's Fajr Film Festival.

She gained international fame as the leading actress in the film 'The Salesman', which won the Oscar for best foreign language film in 2017.

However, she and the rest of the team did not attend the Oscars in protest at Donald Trump's Decree 13769, which banned citizens from Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States.

Pictured: the team celebrates the award at Tehran's Film Museum on March 3, 2017.