ROME: A resolution calling on Iran to immediately cease handing down death sentences to anti-government protestors, to withdraw all charges against them and free them from detention was unanimously approved by the Foreign and European Affairs Committee of the Italian Chamber of Deputies.
The text calls for the release of those “arrested solely for having peacefully exercised their rights to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly in the context of the protests,” the speaker of the committee, Giulio Tremonti, told Arab News.
Tremonti stressed that the resolution “was backed by all the parties, as a sign of the unity of Italy in the support to the Iranian population,” calling the cross-party agreement “really remarkable.”
The resolution binds the Italian government to call for the annulment of the death sentences issued against demonstrators and to request their immediate and unconditional release.
A few days ago the Italian Senate’s Foreign and Defense Committee approved a similar resolution.
Andrea Orsini, a deputy with the Forza Italia party who presented the resolution at the committee, said in a press conference attended by Arab News at the Montecitorio Palace that “it is intolerable that Iran is so aggressive towards democracy and remains a factor of instability for the world and for the Middle East.”
MP Federica Onori of the Five Star Movement stressed that “what is happening in Iran is seriously unbelievable,” while Ettore Rosato from the Italia Viva party called for the “need to politically isolate the regime in Tehran; that regime has nothing to do with the population.”
In a conference speech to Italian ambassadors based around the world on Wednesday, Italy’s President Sergio Mattarella stated that he deplored the brutal crackdown against the protests that have swept Iran since the death of the 22-year-old Kurdish woman Masha Amini while in police custody in September, after she was detained for allegedly wearing her hijab incorrectly.
Mattarella stressed that Iran “has exceeded all limits” in its bloody crackdown on protests. “This cannot, in any way, be set aside,” he added.
