Iran's ambassador to Sweden has been summoned and received "our strongest protests," he says.
The Iranian regime bears full responsibility for this, the Prime Minister says.
We have known about this case since June 2025. We have had many contacts and demanded his release and that the risk of the death penalty be removed. Now they have done this anyway.
The person was arrested by Iranian authorities in June 2025. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard (M) confirmed in December that the man was imprisoned in Iran.
"When I learned late yesterday that the execution was imminent, I immediately sought talks with my counterpart, Iran's Foreign Minister, to protest in the strongest possible terms. But unfortunately my counterpart did not make himself available for talks," Malmer Stenergard tells TT.
Out of consideration for relatives, the Minister of Foreign Affairs does not want to go into who the person is, but according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, it is the same person who was described in Swedish media in December.
Not recognized
The Swedish citizen Ahmadreza Djalali has also been imprisoned and sentenced to death in Iran. The Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs continues to demand his immediate release on humanitarian grounds.
The person who has now been executed came to Sweden in 2015 and became a Swedish citizen in 2019. However, the Swedish citizenship has not been recognized by Iran, according to Malmer Stenergard. Swedish representatives have therefore only been able to follow the legal process remotely.
"We stand by the fact that this was a Swedish citizen and that we had the right to consular access. But as I said, it has been very difficult, just like in other cases," she says.
It has been a very flawed legal process.
Strained relationship
Sweden has also lodged protests in Tehran, according to the Foreign Minister.
Relations between Sweden and Iran are already very strained, partly because Sweden has been "very proactive" in putting more pressure on Iran in various contexts, according to Malmer Stenergard.
It is clear that this makes things even more difficult, she says.
We will, of course, consider all possible measures, but we have already taken many measures to put pressure on the Iranian regime.
EU Foreign Affairs Chief Kaja Kallas condemned the execution in a statement.
"A brutal and senseless act of violence that we condemn," she writes.
