Iranian authorities have deprived rapper Toomaj Salehi of telephone communications, whose death sentence is causing strong protests across the world, his supporters said on social networks on Tuesday.
Toomaj Salehi, 33, who uses his first name as his stage name, was arrested in October 2022. He was sentenced to death last week for “corruption on earth” by the revolutionary court in Isfahan (center).
He had supported, via his songs and on social networks, the protest movement triggered after the death on September 16, 2022 of Mahsa Amini, a young Iranian Kurd detained by the morality police, who accused him of having broken the strict code clothing imposed on women.
“Toomaj’s permission to telephone was removed in Dastgerd prison in Isfahan,” according to the official X (ex-Twitter) account which bears his name and which is now controlled by an administrator.
“This means he no longer has any contact with his family and the outside world,” he added. “Moreover, in order to exert maximum psychological pressure on him, all prisoners at Dastgerd are forbidden from speaking to him and have been threatened with severe punishment if they do.”
German MP Ye-One Rhie, who is actively following her case, posted this comment on X: “Let’s be clear: this is torture.”
The death sentence of the Iranian rapper was denounced last Thursday by France, Italy, and experts from a UN working group. Support demonstrations were organized this weekend in several cities around the world, including Toronto, Paris and Sydney.
According to UN experts, the rapper was initially sentenced to six years in prison, before the courts ordered his release. But he was arrested again in November.
Several hundred people, including members of the security forces, were killed and thousands arrested during the protests which took place in October and November 2022 in Iran, before ebbing away.
Nine people were executed in connection with this uprising, according to NGOs. Six others are threatened with imminent execution, according to the NGO IHR (Iran Human Rights).
