Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of whether Iran has contravened the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights since the start of recent hostilities between USA and Israel and Iran.

The UK has long made clear that Iran's human rights record is unacceptable - a position that has not changed since the outset of the US/Iran conflict on 28 February 2026. We continue to pressure Iran, both directly and at the UN, to end its human rights violations and to protect the rights of the Iranian people. On 16 March 2026, UK Human Rights Ambassador, Eleanor Sanders, said at the UN Human Rights Council that the Iranian authorities must not seek, as we have seen in the past, to exploit conflict to inflict further violence on its people and on 16 June, she highlighted at the Council the continued execution of protesters and Iran's longstanding suppression of peaceful dissent. We continue to support accountability efforts toward the Iranian authorities' abhorrent crackdown on the January 2026 protests, which the Foreign Secretary condemned in the House on 13 January and alongside G7 Foreign Ministers on 15 January. The Minister for the Middle East, Hamish Falconer, summoned the Iranian Ambassador to the UK on 13 January, making clear the UK's opposition to the regime's brutal use of violence and repression against peaceful protesters. We maintain 105 human rights sanctions against the Iranian regime.