Irán condena a 74 latigazos a cantante por concierto sin velo en YouTube

A 27-minute video uploaded to YouTube on December 11th became the basis for a sentence that would reshape one woman's life. Parastoo Ahmadi, an Iranian singer, had filmed what she called a hypothetical concert inside a historic caravanserai—a traditional roadside inn. She wore a long black dress with bare shoulders. She wore no veil. She sang, accompanied by four musicians, in a space that under Iranian law should never have hosted such a performance.

On June 18th, 2026, a court in Qom handed down its judgment. Ahmadi and eight members of her team—musicians, production staff, collaborators—were each sentenced to 74 lashes. They were barred from leaving the country for two years. They were prohibited from engaging in any artistic work for the same period. The charge, as the Qom Criminal Court framed it, was attacking public morality through the production and distribution of obscene content that violated ethical standards in the digital sphere.

The sentence was announced via Ahmadi's Instagram account, a detail that underscores the peculiar nature of the crime: a performance that existed only online, in a space nominally beyond the reach of Iranian authorities, had been prosecuted as though it were a public transgression. Under the Islamic Republic's rules, women cannot record albums. They are permitted to perform only for female audiences, and never before cameras or photographers. Ahmadi had violated both prohibitions simultaneously, broadcasting her concert to anyone with an internet connection.

The response from Iranian authorities was swift. Within 24 hours of the video's publication, judicial officials announced they had filed charges against Ahmadi and her collaborators for holding the concert without permission and for disregarding legal and religious norms. The machinery of enforcement moved quickly, as it does in cases involving challenges to state-mandated codes of conduct.

This was not Ahmadi's first brush with the system. In 2022, during the protests that erupted after Mahsa Amini died in police custody for allegedly wearing her headscarf improperly, Ahmadi released a song titled "From the Blood of the Nation's Youth." That act of artistic solidarity had already marked her as someone willing to use her voice against the state's restrictions. The current sentence suggests the authorities had been waiting for another opportunity to make an example.

The timing of Ahmadi's concert video, however, placed it within a broader shift in Iranian society. Two years had passed since Amini's death and the mass protests that followed. In the intervening period, many Iranian women had stopped wearing the veil as an act of civil disobedience. By early 2025, authorities had effectively ceased enforcing the laws that made the hijab mandatory. On the streets of Tehran and other Iranian cities, it had become commonplace to see women with uncovered heads. The state's grip on this particular form of control had loosened, at least in practice.

Yet the court's sentence suggests that the legal framework remains intact, and that those who challenge it through public performance—especially through media that reaches beyond Iran's borders—will still face punishment. Ahmadi's case sits at the intersection of two realities: a society where women are increasingly ignoring dress codes in daily life, and a judiciary that continues to prosecute artistic expression that violates those same codes. The 74 lashes, the travel ban, the two-year prohibition on performing—these are the state's answer to a woman who sang without permission, without a veil, and without apology.