On Thursday, the European Parliament adopted a resolution on human rights issues in Iran, in particular the latest attacks against women, women’s rights defenders, and the arbitrary detention of EU nationals.
Parliament strongly condemns the deterioration of the human rights situation in Iran, and the brutal murders of women by the Iranian authorities, including the 2023 Sakharov Prize laureate Jina Mahsa Amini. MEPs urge the Iranian authorities to end immediately all discrimination against women and girls, including mandatory veiling, and to withdraw all gender discriminatory laws.
They strongly condemn Iran’s practice of arbitrary detention, withholding medical treatment, police violence, torture, capital punishment, and the alarming rise in the number of executions. MEPs want the immediate release of all victims of arbitrary detention and human rights defenders, including Narges Mohammadi, Sepideh Gholian, Golrokh Iraee, Nasrin Javadi and Bahareh Hedayat.
The resolution condemns Iran’s hostage diplomacy and urges the EU to launch an EU strategy to counter it. MEPs also demand the immediate and unconditional releases of Johan Floderus, Ahmadreza Djalali, Nahid Taghavi, Kamran Ghaderi, Jamshid Sharmahd and Massoud Mossaheb.
They reiterate their call for the initiation of criminal investigations into crimes committed by the Iranian authorities under universal jurisdiction, to designate the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organisation and sanction those responsible for human rights violations in Iran, including the Supreme Leader, the President and the Prosecutor-General. Parliament calls on the European External Action Service and member states to support Sakharov and Nobel Prize laureates, and urges member states to facilitate the issuance of visas and asylum and emergency grants to those who need them.
The text was adopted by 516 votes in favour, 4 against with 27 abstentions.
