Iran-EU relations have proved rocky in recent years due to the country’s continuing human rights violations. Parliament has repeatedly called for more action.
Iranian women protesters honoured with Sakharov Prize
Parliament awarded the 2023 Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought to the late Jina Mahsa Amini and to the Woman, Life, Freedom movement in Iran that has been demanding strengthening women’s rights in the country.
Massive protests erupted in Iran in the wake of Amini dying in police custody in September 2022 after allegedly wearing her headscarf improperly. The government launched a violent crackdown, arresting protesters and shutting down social media.
In response to these developments, on 19 January 2023 Parliament called for more sanctions against the Iranian regime, saying that all those responsible for human rights violations should face EU sanctions, while the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps should be on the EU terrorist list.
Parliament resolutions on Iran
Amini’s death at the hands of Iranian police is far from being the only time MEPs have spoken against serious violations of human rights in the country.
In a resolution adopted in March 2023, Parliament condemned the poisoning of hundreds of school girls that had been reported in Iran. These attacks with toxic chemicals were allegedly aimed at preventing them from attending education.
In a resolution adopted in November 2023, MEPs reiterated their call for the initiation of criminal investigations into crimes committed by the Iranian authorities.
Parliament has been following the human rights situation closely in Iran. In recent years it has adopted various resolutions to call attention to the situation of people who are both EU and Iran citizens being held in prison; those of human rights defenders, such as Nasrin Sotoudeh, a prominent human rights lawyer and winner of the European Parliament’s Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought in 2012; and that of women’s rights defenders. MEPs also criticised the violent crackdown on anti-government protests and condemned the use of the death penalty in the country.
