EU Remembers Mahsa Amini at Sakharov Prize Awarding Ceremony

The European Parliament officially awarded the EU’s top human rights prize to Mahsa Amini and the Woman, Life, Freedom protest movement in Iran during a ceremony in Strasbourg on December 12.

“This year’s Sakharov Prize serves as a tribute to all the brave and defiant women, men and young people in Iran who, despite coming under increasing pressure, are continue the push for change,” the parliament’s President Roberta Metsola said.

Metsola deplored that none of Mahsa’s relatives was allowed to attend the event, saying that the travel ban imposed by Iranian authorities on the family “is another example of what the people of Iran face every day.” 

In a heartfelt message to the Sakharov Prize Committee, Mahsa’s mother, Mojgan Eftekhari, said she would have liked to attend the ceremony and “thank you personally and on behalf of all the women of my land." 

"Unfortunately, contrary to all legal and humanitarian norms, we have been denied this opportunity,” she added.

The ceremony was attended by the Amini family’s lawyer, Saleh Nikbakht, as well as Iranian women’s rights defenders Afsoon Najafi and Mercedeh Shahinkar. 

Mahsa, 22, died in Tehran in September 2022 while in police custody, three days after she was arrested for an alleged hijab infraction. 

Her death triggered months of protests that spread across the country and rapidly escalated into calls for the overthrow of the four-decade-old Islamic theocracy in Iran.

Authorities responded with a brutal crackdown in which more than 500 people were killed and over 22,000 others were unlawfully detained, according to activists. 

Following biased trials, the judiciary handed down stiff sentences, including the death penalty, to protesters. At least eight of them have been executed so far.

The 27-nation EU has imposed several rounds of sanctions on Iranian officials and entities for their involvement in the clampdown on the women-led protests.

In her message, Eftekhari wrote that her daughter “spread the dream of freedom from her hometown of Kurdistan to the whole of Iran, the Middle East and the world, mobilizing millions of oppressed women and men.”

"I firmly believe that her name will forever embody freedom alongside Joan of Arc's name," she added, in referrence to a saint honored as a defender of the French nation during the Hundred Years' War.