Another participant, Ali, told POLITICO that he was protesting for the Iranian people. “For the last two weeks, more than 20,000 dead. We stand behind the people. We’re going to the European Parliament,” he said.
Iran has been the scene of widespread and escalating unrest since the end of 2025, with protesters calling for political change in the country that has faced a sharp economic downturn. The protests in Iran have been met by increasingly brutal government crackdown, involving mass arrests, killings and a near-total internet shutdown.
Rights organizations say that thousands have been killed and arrested during the unrest. The U.N. Human Rights Council held an emergency session on the situation in Iran and acknowledged that the violence against protesters in recent weeks has been the deadliest since the Iranian revolution in 1979.