Iranians Arrested For Dancing To Pharrell's ``Happy'' Clip

A group of six young men and women have been arrested in Iran for posting a parody music video of Pharrell William's monster hit ‘Happy' on Youtube, local sources reported. Five of them are now believed to have been released.

The clip, "Happy we are from Tehran," has gathered near 500,000 hits online and went viral throughout Iranian social media outlets. It features a group of young Iranian men and women getting groovy on the rooftops and streets of Tehran as they lip-synch and dance to the beat of the song. Watch the video after the cut...

City Police Chief Hossein Sajedinia told Iran's official Isna news agency that the video was "vulgar" enough to "hurt public chastity," Agence France-Presse reported.

"Following a series of intelligence and police operations in cooperation with the judicial authorities, all the suspects were identified and arrested within 6 hours," Sajedinia said, while making no mention of the fact that the clip -­ one of some 1,500 copy versions of William's original music video made around the world -­ has been up online for a month before the arrest.

In a follow-up TV footage released by the police, the arrested six people, dubbed "actors" under English subtitle, tell law enforcement officials they were tricked into making the video after being promised it would not be published online.

After "confessing their criminal acts," all participants except the director are now believed to be released on bail, The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran (ICHRI) said on Wednesday.

After the news broke out, Williams, whose song was nominated for a Grammy this year, protested at the arrest. ''It is beyond sad that these kids were arrested for trying to spread happiness,'' he said on his Facebook wall.

Iranian president Hassan Rouhani was also critical of the event, saying, ''Happiness is our people's right. We shouldn't be too hard on behaviors caused by joy,'' on his tweeter page.

Under Iran's interpretation of the strict Sharia law imposed after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, women in public must cover their head with the hijab as a sign of their modesty. The Islamic dress code is enforced on the streets by the "morality police" and the internet is also heavily censored, according to BBC Persian.

The clip's creators - young students, filmmakers and photographers - said they wanted to show the world Iran's young people "have moments of joy and happiness even though they live with many difficulties," The Independent reported.

Courtesy: koreatimes