Lawyer says Iranian cartoonist freed after prison sentence

By The Associated Press

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – An Iranian cartoonist imprisoned over portraying lawmakers as animals to criticize a draft law restricting contraception and criminalizing voluntary sterilization has been released from prison.

A lawyer for Atena Farghadani says she was freed from Tehran’s Evin prison on Tuesday.

Mohammad Moghimi told The Associated Press: “I am very happy that she and her parents reunited.”

Moghimi says Farghadani was freed after an appeals court last month reduced her 12-year prison sentence to 18 months.

Farghadani was imprisoned amid a wider crackdown by hard-liners targeting free expression in Iran. Poets, filmmakers and journalists have been charged and imprisoned.

On Tuesday, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani called for more freedom of speech in his country, saying government critics should not be imprisoned.

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