Anita Papisto, an underground singer based in Tehran, says Branch 1088 of Tehran’s Ershad Criminal Court Two has sentenced her to 74 lashes on a charge of “offending public decency.” The case centers on musical performances she posted to her personal Instagram page.
Her passport has reportedly been confiscated and her phone line cut off. Since the full text of the verdict has not been made public, it remains unclear whether the sentence is final or can still be appealed, and whether the passport seizure and phone disconnection were part of the court’s ruling or imposed separately.
Iranian law does not explicitly criminalize women singing as a distinct offense. The charge in this case draws on the second clause of Article 638 of the Islamic Penal Code, which punishes conduct that carries no defined penalty of its own but that a court judges to “offend public decency.” Applying this article requires the court to establish, with clear reasoning, the specific conduct involved, whether it was public, and how it caused harm to public decency. The mere fact that a singer is a woman, or that her voice was shared on social media, cannot substitute for actually proving these elements of the offense.
Even under the official reading of Shia jurisprudence the Islamic Republic invokes, a woman’s voice is not considered forbidden in itself; restrictions are limited to specific cases such as singing associated with vice, arousing desire, or causing corruption. Turning these narrow jurisprudential conditions into a blanket ban on women singing, without any clear, foreseeable definition in law, sits uneasily with the principle of legality in criminal law and the requirement that criminal statutes be read narrowly.
Music and singing fall under the protection of artistic expression guaranteed by Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, as well as the right to take part in cultural life under Article 15 of the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Any restriction on these rights must be lawful, necessary, and proportionate. Punishing a woman for an activity men are free to pursue openly also raises questions of gender discrimination under Articles 3 and 26 of the Covenant, while the sentence of flogging itself runs against the prohibition on cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment in Article 7.
As things stand, the Islamic Republic of Iran and Taliban-ruled Afghanistan are two prominent examples where a woman’s singing voice can become grounds for criminal punishment. The Taliban has written this restriction directly into its “Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice” law, targeting women’s raised voices and singing outright. In Iran, a similar outcome is reached through vague concepts like “public decency” and a criminal reading of jurisprudential rulings.
As a matter of law, the flogging sentence should be suspended until the case is fully resolved and a final ruling reached. The legal basis for confiscating her passport and cutting off her phone line should also be disclosed, and she should have a genuine opportunity to challenge all of these measures.