AFP, Berlin, Feb 16, 2010  – Award-winning Iranian director Jafar Panahi has been denied permission to leave his home country to attend the Berlin Film Festival, organisers said on Tuesday.
Panahi, an honorary guest at this year’s festival, had been due to participate in a panel discussion on Wednesday on Iranian cinema with compatriot fellow directors Rafi Pitts and Reza Haeri.
’We are surprised and deeply regret that a director who has won so many international prizes has been denied the possibility to take part in our anniversary festival and to speak about his cinematic visions,’ Berlinale director Dieter Kosslick said in a statement.
Pitts, who was in Berlin to present his film ’Shekarchi’ (The Hunter), said: ’I think that he (Panahi) should be here … I think it is ridiculous to think that you can stop people saying what they think.’
President Mahmoud Ahamdinejad’s disputed re-election last June plunged the Islamic republic into one of its worst ever political crises, with the authorities launching a violent crackdown on demonstrators.
All productions and publications are subject to vetting before being released in Iran but film-makers and scriptwriters have faced tougher censorship under Ahamdinejad.
Iranian news agencies cited Panahi as saying in October than he had been prevented from leaving the country for France, saying his passport was confiscated at the airport.
On July 30, Panahi and members of his family were arrested in a Tehran cemetery at an Opposition protest in memory of demonstrators killed in street violence after the election. They were released shortly afterwards.