Iran’s Asghar Farhadi, winner of the best foreign language film Sunday night at the 89th Academy Awards, in a statement denounced the "inhumane law that bans entry of immigrants to the US."
Iranian-American engineer Anousheh Ansari, the first female space tourist, represented Farhadi at the awards ceremony along with former NASA scientist Firouz Naderi. Ansari read the statement.
Farhadi won for his film "The Salesman," the story of a couple whose relationship begins to turn sour during their performance of Arthur Miller's "Death of a Salesman."
Farhadi, who also won an Oscar in 2011, in his speech thanked the members of his academy, his crew in Iran, Amazon - which picked up the film - and his fellow nominees.
"I'm sorry I'm not with you tonight," he said in the statement. "My absence is out of respect for the people of my country and those of other six nations whom have been disrespected by the inhuman law that bans entry of immigrants to the U.S. Dividing the world - thank you. Dividing the world into the us and our enemies categories creates fear. A deceitful justification for aggression and war. These wars prevent democracy and human rights in countries which have themselves been victims of aggression. Filmmakers can turn their cameras to capture shared human qualities and break stereotypes of various nationalities and religions. They create empathy between us and others. An empathy which we need today more than ever."
In a joint statement two days before the Academy Awards, five other directors nominated along with Farhadi decried the “climate of fascism’ in the U.S. and other countries.
They were: Denmark’s Martin Zandvliet, Sweden’s Hannes Holm, Germany’s Maren Ade and the two directors of Australia’s “Tanna”: Martin Butler and Bentley Dean. They blamed “leading politicians” for generating fear by “dividing us into genders, colors, religions and sexualities.”
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