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Members of the European Parliament call on Kallas to meet the Djalali family

by AI | 24.Apr 2025 | Europe in brief AI

A group of Members of the European Parliament is calling on Kaja Kallas, the High Representative for Foreign Affairs of the European Union, in a letter to meet with the family of Ahmadreza Djalali, the Swedish-Iranian emergency doctor and guest lecturer at VUB, who will be exactly nine years in prison in Tehran tomorrow/Friday. “Djalali must not become a forgotten hostage,” says Belgian MEP Hilde Vautmans (Open VLD), one of the signatories of the letter.

Members of the European Parliament urge Kallas to meet the Djalali family (Photo: John THYS/AFP)

The Members of the European Parliament, including Belgians Bruno Tobback, Kathleen Van Brempt (Vooruit), and Sophie Wilmès (MR), demand in the joint letter to Kallas that the European Union uses its diplomatic weight for the release of Djalali.

“Djalali has been wrongfully imprisoned for nine years, under inhumane conditions, and lives daily under the threat of execution,” says Vautmans in a press release. “His health has seriously deteriorated, and his family has been psychologically tortured for years.”

“We cannot let this case fade into silence. Djalali is an EU citizen – it is our duty to stand up for him. We must not stand by while Iran uses lives as a political bargaining chip. Djalali must not become a forgotten hostage,” says the Member of the European Parliament, who already met with Vida Mehrannia, Djalali’s wife, on Wednesday.

In the letter, the signatories, who sit in the Renew Europe, S&D, and Greens factions, ask that Kallas also publicly meets with Djalali’s family, “to show that the EU stands firmly behind its citizens.” They also urge for more intensive diplomatic pressure on Tehran and for consultations with American partners.

Mehrannia also addressed the members of the Foreign Affairs Committee in Brussels on Thursday. She played a recent audio message from Djalali, in which he calls for joint action from European and Swedish officials. Otherwise, if he dies in prison in Iran, those officials who remain aloof will also be “responsible for his death.”