Italy Urged to Suspend Relations with Tehran over Executions

Maryam Rajavi called on Italy and the European Union to make any diplomatic or commercial relationship with Tehran conditional on an end to executions in Iran.

Rajavi, the president-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, made the appeal during a special hearing on human rights in Iran before the Italian Senate’s Human Rights Committee.

The session was attended by committee chair Stefania Pucciarelli, former Italian foreign minister Giulio Terzi, committee member Bartolomeo Amidei and European Affairs Committee vice-chair Gisella Naturale.

Rajavi told the committee that Iran had intensified its repression over the past year, claiming that around 2,400 people had been executed since a similar hearing was held in July last year.

She said the authorities had used the recent conflict to carry out widespread arrests and political executions, including those of political prisoners and people accused of supporting protests or opposition groups.

Rajavi also raised the case of 25-year-old Arghavan Fallahi, saying she had spent months in solitary confinement and had been subjected to torture, while her father remained in detention.

She argued that executions in Iran were political measures intended to spread fear and prevent further public uprisings rather than the outcome of independent judicial proceedings.

Rajavi also accused the Iranian authorities of systematically denying defendants fair trials through security-service interference, state control of the judiciary and pressure on lawyers.

Addressing the 1988 prison massacre, she said Iranian authorities continued to refuse to publish full lists of victims or disclose burial locations. She said the Iranian resistance had documented the names of thousands of members of the People’s Mojahedin Organisation of Iran who were killed.

Rajavi urged Italy, which has played a major role in international campaigns against capital punishment, to press for stronger European action.

She called for diplomatic and commercial ties with Tehran to be suspended or linked directly to an end to executions, for Iranian officials accused of serious crimes to face prosecution under universal jurisdiction, and for Iran’s human rights record to be referred to the UN Security Council.