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A co-writer of Oscar-nominated film It Was Just an Accident has been arrested in Tehran just weeks before the Academy Awards, after signing a statement condemning Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, for recent bloodshed in the country.
The human rights campaigner Mehdi Mahmoudian was detained on Saturday after adding his name to a statement declaring that “the primary responsibility for these atrocities lies with Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Islamic Republic, and the repressive structure of the regime”.
Two more of the 17 signatories, Vida Rabbani and Abdullah Momeni, have also been arrested. Authorities have so released no information about the charges against those detained.
It Was Just an Accident, which won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes film festival in 2025, is a contender for best international feature film and best screenplay at the Oscars on 15 March.
The film follows a group of Iranian former political prisoners grappling with whether to exact revenge on a man they believe tortured them in prison.
Mahmoudian is primarily known as a journalist and human rights activist. He met the film’s director, the veteran auteur Jafar Panahi, in prison.
In a statement shared with the Guardian, Panahi praised Mahmoudian’s “calm demeanor”, “kind conduct”, and “rare sense of responsibility toward others”.
“Whenever a new prisoner arrived, Mehdi would try to provide them with basic necessities and, more importantly, offer reassurance,” Panahi said. “He became a quiet pillar inside the prison – someone inmates of all beliefs and backgrounds trusted and confided in.”
After Mahmoudian’s release, Panahi invited him to refine the screenplay’s dialogue, drawing on his nine-year experience behind bars.
“Mehdi Mahmoudian is not just a human rights activist and a prisoner of conscience,” Panahi said. “He is a witness, a listener, and a rare moral presence … whose absence is immediately felt, both inside prison walls and beyond them.”
Large protests against the regime’s handling of Iran’s deepening economic crisis erupted across the country in late December. The regime responded with an internet blackout and severe crackdowns.
Iran’s official death toll, released by the Martyrs Foundation, is 3,117, including members of the security services. However, networks of medical professionals inside and outside the country estimate the actual number could exceed 30,000.
