BRUSSELS — On December 10, 2025, the European Parliament served as the stage for a critical convergence of Iranian opposition leaders and Western policymakers. Marking International Human Rights Day, a high-profile conference hosted in Brussels brought together Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), alongside a coalition of former ministers, lawmakers, and international legal experts.
The proceedings focused on a stark dual reality: the Iranian regime’s unprecedented escalation of executions and the simultaneous consolidation of an organized resistance movement. Speakers detailed a human rights crisis that has surpassed historical benchmarks while outlining a “Third Option” for the international community—a policy framework that rejects both appeasement and foreign military intervention, relying instead on the Iranian people to dismantle the religious dictatorship.
https://www.ncr-iran.org/en/news/iran-resistance/eu-lawmakers-and-international-figures-call-for-accountability-in-iran-and-recognition-of-the-ncri-as-a-democratic-alternative/
A Regime “Hanging Human Rights”
The conference opened with a grim accounting of the regime’s recent violence. In her keynote address, Mrs. Maryam Rajavi presented statistics indicating that the clerical regime has accelerated its machinery of death to levels not seen in decades. She revealed that in November alone, the judiciary carried out “335 executions.”
Mrs. Rajavi described a government that “hangs human rights every single day,” highlighting the plight of 18 political prisoners currently sentenced to death solely for their affiliation with the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). She argued that this intensification of violence is a symptom of desperation rather than strength. “Never before have the mullahs been so much in need of intensifying repression because never before have they felt so close to being overthrown,” she told the assembly.
Human Rights Day 2025 – Iran: Human Rights, Accountability & the Role of the EU
🧵Kumi Naidoo, South African human rights and climate justice activist: "I want to offer a six-point plan to the European Union… 1) Demand an immediate moratorium on executions in Iran. 2) Establish…
— Iran News Update (@IranNewsUpdate1) December 10, 2025
Dominique Attias, Chair of the European Lawyers Foundation, characterized the executions as a “deliberate strategy of terror.” She pointed to the regime’s systematic destruction of mass-grave sites—desecrating some 9,500 graves from the 1980s—as an “ultimate profanation” designed to erase evidence of past atrocities.
Stephen Rapp, the former U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for Global Criminal Justice, provided a legal context for these actions. Noting that nearly 2,000 executions have been recorded this year, Rapp classified the violence as ongoing crimes against humanity. “The pattern we see today echoes the logic of 1988,” Rapp observed, referring to the massacre of 30,000 political prisoners. He insisted that Western powers must ensure that the mislabeling of the PMOI as terrorists, which previously hamstrung the opposition, is “never again” repeated.
Demanding a Paradigm Shift in EU Policy
A central theme of the event was the inadequacy of current European policies toward Tehran. Former MEP Struan Stevenson, who moderated the session, dismissed the utility of limited military strikes against the regime’s infrastructure.
“Airstrikes… cannot uproot the epicenter of instability—the clerical dictatorship in Tehran,” Stevenson asserted. He urged the European Union to “end appeasement,” calling for the immediate closure of Iranian embassies used for repression and the designation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization.
This security concern was reinforced by MEP Antonio López-Istúriz White, Chair of the Delegation for Relations with Mexico. Referencing the assassination attempt against former EP Vice-President Alejo Vidal-Quadras in Madrid, he warned that “no normalization of EU-Iran relations is acceptable” while transnational repression continues. López-Istúriz White cautioned that Tehran’s proxy networks pose a direct security threat that extends beyond the Middle East into Europe itself.
The “Third Option” and Resistance Units
Amidst the condemnation, speakers presented the NCRI’s “Third Option” as the only viable path to stability. Former MEP Dorien Rookmaker described the regime as “100 percent pure evil” and advocated for the formal endorsement of Mrs. Rajavi’s Ten-Point Plan, which envisions a secular, non-nuclear republic with gender equality.
Kumi Naidoo, former Secretary-General of Amnesty International, focused on the demographics driving this movement. He described Iranian women and the Resistance Units as “the heartbeat of the nationwide struggle.” Citing the case of Zahra Tabari, a 67-year-old engineer sentenced to death for holding a banner reading “Woman, Resistance, Freedom,” Naidoo argued that such extreme repression reveals the regime’s “political weakness” and fear of its own citizens.
Rejecting the Shah and the Mullahs
A critical distinction made throughout the proceedings was the forward-looking nature of the opposition. Dr. Sina Dashti, an Iranian-Swedish physician, offered testimony regarding the generational struggle against tyranny. He emphasized that Iranian society “rejects both monarchy and theocracy,” noting that the Shah’s suppression of democratic forces had paved the way for the current religious dictatorship.
Mrs. Rajavi reinforced this stance, stating that the Iranian people seek a democratic republic that rejects both the “Shah’s and the mullahs’ autocracies.” The consensus among speakers was that the expanding Resistance Units demonstrate a nationwide will to replace theocratic rule with free elections and the separation of religion and state.
Legal Urgency
The event concluded with urgent calls for legal intervention to protect those currently on death row. Mark Ellis, Executive Director of the International Bar Association, warned that the regime is actively trying to “bury evidence, silence victims, and entrench impunity.” He urged European nations to utilize universal jurisdiction to prosecute regime officials, emphasizing that perpetrators must not believe “time is on their side.”
International human rights lawyer Azadeh Zabeti underscored the immediacy of the crisis. She warned that the execution of the 18 PMOI supporters would amount to “deliberate political killings by the state,” calling on the international community to recognize the NCRI’s roadmap as the definitive solution to the crisis.
