Sakharov Prize honors Mahsa Amini and the women's movement in Iran

The Sakharov Prize, the EU's highest distinction for human rights, was awarded Thursday by the European Parliament to Mahsa Amini, a young Iranian Kurd who died last year, and to the "Woman Life Freedom" movement bloodily repressed by power in Iran. “The brutal murder of Jina Mahsa Amini”, on September 16, 2022, three days after her arrest by the police for an ill-fitting veil, “marked a turning point”, declared the President of Parliament, Roberta Metsola, in Strasbourg.

“It sparked a women-led movement that made history. The slogan “Woman Life Freedom” has become a rallying cry for all those who defend equality, dignity and freedom in Iran,” she added. The death of Mahsa Amini, at the age of 22, led to months of large-scale demonstrations against Iranian political and religious leaders, whose repression caused hundreds of deaths and thousands of arrests.

The “Woman Life Freedom” uprising has continued in different forms and appears to be one of the greatest challenges to the Iranian authorities since the 1979 revolution. On Tuesday, the lawyer for Mahsa Amini's family, Saleh Nikbakht, was sentenced by Iranian courts to one year in prison for “propaganda” against the state, after speaking with foreign media about the case.

On October 6, another Iranian human rights activist, Narges Mohammadi, aged 51, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her stubborn fight against compulsory veiling in Iran, and in favor of human rights . She is currently detained in Evin Prison in Tehran. According to her, the "Woman Life Liberty" movement has "accelerated the process of democracy, freedom and equality" in the country, at the same time as it has "weakened the foundations of a despotic religious government."

The European Parliament has repeatedly condemned the Iranian authorities' repression of protests, and described the human rights situation in the country as "desperate". In October 2022, MEPs called for sanctions against the regime, then demanded in January 2023 the inclusion on the list of terrorist organizations of the Revolutionary Guard Corps.

To mark the anniversary of the death of Mahsa Amini, the United States, the EU and the United Kingdom announced in mid-September new sanctions against Iranian political leaders and members of the security forces, and against certain companies in the country.

Two other finalists were in the running for the Sakharov Prize: two Nicaraguan human rights activists, Vilma Nunez de Escorcia and Bishop Rolando José Alvarez Lagos, as well as three abortion rights activists, Justyna Wydrzynska (Poland), Morena Herrera (El Salvador) and Colleen McNicholas (United States).

The candidacy of the controversial boss of X (formerly Twitter), Elon Musk, proposed by the Identity and Democracy (ID) group, was not selected among the finalists. Since October 12, the social network

Created in 1988, the Sakharov Prize “for freedom of thought” rewards individuals or organizations defending human rights and fundamental freedoms each year. The 2023 prize will be formally awarded during a ceremony in the Strasbourg hemicycle on December 13. Endowed with 50,000 euros, it bears the name of the Soviet dissident and nuclear physicist Andreï Sakharov, Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1975. The Ukrainian people, the imprisoned Russian opponent Alexeï Navalny, the opposition to the Belarusian, and the imprisoned Uighur intellectual Ilham Tohti are among the latest winners of the prize.