Iran ‘Happy’ singers get suspended sentences. Six Iranians arrested for appearing in a video singing along to Pharrell Williams’ hit song Happy were given suspended sentences of 91 lashes and six months in prison for obscene behaviour, a news website quoted their lawyer as saying. Another defendant who faced “heavier charges” in relation to the video was handed a suspended sentence of one year in jail and 91 lashes by the authorities, the Iran Wire site quoted Farshid Rofugaran as saying. The sentences are suspended for three years, meaning that if any of the seven is found guilty of a similar offence, the punishment will then be carried out, he said without elaborating. Iran Wire is a news and features website run from outside the Islamic Republic. The defendants, four men and three women, were detained by police in May after six of them were shown lip synching to Pharrell Williams’ hit song Happy. The women appearing in the clip were bare-headed in violation of the Islamic dress code enforced after the 1979 Islamic revolution. The arrests in May drew condemnation from the singer and his fans through social media — as well as indirect criticism from moderate President, Hassan Rouhani. “The way to deal with cultural issues is cultural work, not policemen and (detention) vans and strong-arm tactics,” the president told a gathering of conservative clerics in the religious city of Mashhad earlier this month. irishexaminer/world/iran-happy-singers-get-suspended-sentences-287552.html
Posted on: Fri, 19 Sep 2014 08:37:40 +0000
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