Iran’s Qom Court Sentences Parastoo Ahmadi and Team to 74 Lashes

Iran’s Qom Provincial Criminal Court has sentenced singer Parastoo Ahmadi and eight members of a production team, including musicians, to 74 lashes for performing in a concert livestreamed on Ahmadi’s YouTube channel in 2024.

“The singer and eight members of her team, accused of disseminating "immoral content," will not be able to work or leave the country for two years”

El País

The Guardian reports that court documents say the artists were also given a two-year ban on leaving the country and a two-year ban on engaging in artistic activities on charges that include offending public decency through the production and publication of “vulgar and immoral content” online.

El País

El País says Ahmadi and eight members of her team were sentenced to receive 74 lashes and “will also not be able to work or leave the country for two years,” after the performance at the caravansary of Deir Gachin in the city of Qom, 156 kilometers southwest of Tehran.

In the same case, the court ruled the performers had offended “public decency through the production and publication of obscene and immoral content on cyberspace platforms,” according to The Jerusalem Post.

Ynetnews says the controversy began in December 2024 when Ahmadi, born in 1997, held a live YouTube performance in which she appeared without a hijab, accompanied by four male musicians, and published the link to the performance on YouTube a day earlier with the message: “I am Parastoo, a girl who wants to sing for the people she loves. It is a right I cannot ignore; to sing for the country I love so much.”

After the performance, Ynetnews reports that security forces raided Ahmadi’s home, she was summoned for questioning at the prosecutor’s office, and Iranian authorities announced she would be prosecuted, with pianist Ehsan Beiraqdar and guitarist Soheil Faqih-Nasiri also arrested.

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The Guardian quotes human rights lawyer Moein Khazaeli, who said the sentence lacked legal basis, arguing: “Singing, performing music and producing or disseminating musical works by women are not criminalised under Iranian criminal law.”

RFE/RL’s Radio Farda says the YouTube video has “racked up 2.9 million views over the last two years,” and that Ahmadi was sentenced to 74 lashes along with a travel ban and a prohibition on “artistic activities” for the next two years.

The Guardian reports that Bahar Ghandehari, director of advocacy at the US-based Center for Human Rights in Iran, said the punishment of 74 lashes for singing without a hijab is “yet another reminder that human rights conditions in Iran have not changed.”

Nazanin Boniadi, quoted by The Guardian, said: “The sentencing of singer Parastoo Ahmadi to flogging for the simple act of singing publicly without a hijab is a stark reminder that, despite talk in Washington of a ‘new regime’ in Iran, the Islamic republic’s machinery of repression remains unchanged.”

El País says the performance was streamed live via Ahmadi’s YouTube channel from the caravansary of Deir Gachin in Qom, and that the case opened after she sang without a veil, with the singer and her team accused of disseminating “immoral content” and “offending public morality.”

The Guardian adds that rights groups and lawyers who reviewed court documents said the pattern of arrests and legal cases against artists publicly defying the regime reflects a broader effort to deter cultural dissent, while RFE/RL notes the sentence was issued for a virtual concert that has drawn 2.9 million views.