Dissident director and screenwriter Bahare Lelahi was killed by Iran’s security forces and buried in secret.
According to a reliable source, security forces demanded money from her family to disclose her burial location and ordered them to keep her death private.
While the exact circumstances surrounding her death remain unclear, human rights activists believe it is a state-backed killing based on the actions of state agents, such as the cover-up and secret burial.
Lelahi, 40, who was briefly detained during the 2022 nationwide protest, went missing in March 2023. In September 2022, the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, which the UN’s fact-finding mission pinned on state authorities, ignited nationwide demonstrations, during which more than 550 protesters were killed.
