Brussels, October 23rd, 2026 – On Thursday afternoon, the European Parliament awarded the prestigious Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought to the International Criminal Court and its judges, only weeks after the United States sanctioned the controversial court. In her short announcement, EP President Roberta Metsola explained the choice by stating that the European Union is built on respect for multilateralism and international institutions.
Commenting on the decision only minutes after the announcement in Strasbourg, ECI Founding Director Tomas Sandell expressed his disappointment.
“By choosing to antagonise the United States at a time when the Western alliance is trying to bring an end to the ongoing Russian aggression against Ukraine, the European Parliament has weakened the transatlantic alliance and jeopardised the security of EU member states, while dismissing real human rights concerns around the world, including the ongoing repression in Iran,” he said.
It is unfortunate that the European Parliament chooses to make a political statement in support of a highly politicised criminal court that is obsessed with Israel and the free world, while fellow finalists Taraneh and Romina Rahimi remain imprisoned in Iran. Taraneh is on death row, and her twin sister Romina is in jail for having demonstrated lawfully against the Islamic Republic during the brutal crackdown of 8–9 January, in which some 40,000 civilians were murdered in cold blood on the streets of Iran. The ICC has done nothing to bring justice to their cause. By maintaining diplomatic relations with the oppressive Islamic Republic of Iran, the EU is taking the side of the oppressor instead of the victims.
The Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov, in whose name the European Parliament’s prize is awarded, himself suffered repression while the Soviet Union was a full member of all the international institutions of the multilateral system, through which it sought immunity for its crimes. Today, the ICC and related international institutions, such as the UN Human Rights Council, continue to ignore the atrocities of the world’s most repressive regimes while singling out democracies that protect their own civilians.
While this decision will be celebrated in Moscow, as it weakens the transatlantic alliance, and welcomed in Tehran, where the regime can continue to suppress its population unhindered in the name of national sovereignty, the real victims are Taraneh and Romina, who, like Sakharov, suffer under a brutal regime protected by international institutions.
