Iranian director Jafar Panahi has been sentenced to six years in prison for "colluding in gathering and making propaganda against the regime". Panahi has also been banned from directing films or speaking to the press for 20 years.
CATEGORY: News and features

Belarus: Artists, activists facing detention and trial
Entire staff of Charter97 held by KGB – Index on Censorship learns of prison abuse – Natalia Koliada released
Belarus Free Theatre’s Nikolai Khalezin sought by police
Index has learned that Special Forces broke into the apartment of Nikolai Khalezin, art director of Belarus Free Theatre, this morning [20 December] and arrested him. He is reported to have been taken to unknown destination. He is already third...
Belarus: Opposition candidates beaten, arrested
Reports are emerging from Belarus that opposition leaders Andrei Sannikov, Nikolai Statkevich, Rygor Katusev and Vitaly Rymanshevsky have been arrested by police. Sannikov had earlier declared a provisional coalition in Belarus, after thousands...
Belarus Free Theatre founder detained
Index on Censorship has learned that Natalia Koliada, a founder member of the Belarus Free Theatre, has been detained by authorities in Minsk. Koliada has been unable to contact other members of the dissident theatre group. Tens of thousands of...

Belarussian presidential elections: Thousands protest
As the world’s attention turns to Europe’s last dictatorship, Index’s Mike Harris explains the background to today’s demonstrations

Margaret Atwood: a truly free society is one that allows writers to speak with their own voice
The Handmaid’s Tale author says “Don’t tell us what to write”
Breaking News: High court upholds Julian Assange bail decision
The High Court in London has upheld the lower court's decision to release Wikileaks founder on bail. The 39-year-old Australian was granted bail on Tuesday but prosecutors objected to the decision and he remained in jail. Assange is fighting...
Shocking America
As funders threaten to punish the US gallery that censorsed the first major US exhibition of gay art, Salil Tripathi looks at the fallout of America’s culture wars

Phone hacking: Questions to answer
Today’s revelations on the News of the World’s phone hacking puts the police under the spotlight, says Brian Cathcart. The Met should be taken off the case and the investigation reopened