UN mission: US strike that hit Iran school was ‘indiscriminate,’ likely a war crime

GENEVA, Switzerland — A United Nations fact-finding mission said on Thursday it had reasonable grounds to believe the US committed war crimes during two strikes in Iran carried out in the initial hours of the current war.

It also found that Iranian authorities committed crimes against humanity during their deadly crackdown on anti-government protests before the war.

The report concerns two US strikes on February 28: one that hit a school and killed more than 100 children, and another on a sports center in Lamerd that killed or wounded nearly two dozen people. The report accused the US military of failing to take all necessary precautions to prevent civilian harm.

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The findings in a new report by the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Iran, to be submitted to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, examined US conduct during the war, as well as the Iranian government’s response to nationwide unrest that began in late December.

The Pentagon declined to comment on a report conducted by an outside organization.

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“Our investigation remains ongoing, and we have nothing to announce at the moment,” it said in a statement. White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said in response to the report that the UN Human Rights Council had “accomplished nothing for human rights,” adding that Iran was the only party in the current conflict that had committed war crimes.

The Iranian permanent mission in Geneva did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment.

US officials have previously said military operations are conducted in accordance with the law of armed conflict. Iran has consistently rejected allegations of systematic rights violations.

UN Fact-Finding missions are investigative, but not judicial, and therefore do not initiate any criminal cases. Their findings, however, can be used in criminal investigations by national courts or international tribunals such as the International Criminal Court, to which the US is not a party.

The Iran report was compiled using a “reasonable grounds to believe” standard of proof and was based on interviews with 73 people in and outside of Iran, as well as satellite imagery, photos and videos, and information from subject-matter experts.

States will discuss the report’s findings when it is presented to the Human Rights Council in Geneva on Monday.‌

UN: Strike that hit Minab School was ‘indiscriminate’

The UN experts said they found reasonable grounds to believe US forces were responsible for an attack on the Shajareh Tayyebeh Primary School in the city of Minab, in southern Iran, where more than 150 people were killed, including around 120 schoolchildren, according to Iranian officials.

According to the report, the US failure to update information in relation to the school, which was adjacent to an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps naval complex, in its targeting databases and to confirm the building was a military objective “went beyond mere negligence,” rendering it “indiscriminate” and thus a war crime.

The report said the US “directed the strikes at the building of the school while being aware of a substantial risk of striking a civilian object and acting recklessly as regards the possibility that this would happen.”

The school, which had been operating since 2016, was separated from the IRGC complex by a wall, and included “multiple features readily identifying the structure as an educational facility for young children, which were publicly available prior to the airstrike,” the UN said.

“These included child-oriented murals painted on exterior walls, school signage, and playground areas. According to public reporting, satellite imagery of the school before the strike also appears to show human figures, readily identifiable as children, gathered in its courtyard,” it said.

In June, US President Donald Trump said that “nobody” purposefully attacked a girls’ school in ​Iran in February, citing an investigation into the incident. Reuters first ‌reported that an initial internal US military investigation showed US forces were likely responsible for the fatal strike in Minab.

The Pentagon has ​since elevated the probe but it has not published any ​preliminary findings.

The experts also took issue with a strike on a sports center in Lamerd that it said damaged nearby residential buildings and a school, and killed and injured 22 civilians.

It concluded that the strike was indiscriminate and therefore constituted a war crime, arguing that the munition used — allegedly a US-made Precision Strike Missile — was too imprecise to use in that area, “irrespective of the intended target.”

US Central Command said in a statement in March that US forces did not launch any strikes into the city of Lamerd on that day, saying the munition seen in footage was more consistent with an Iranian Hoveyzeh cruise missile.

However, the UN said footage of the strike rebutted this, citing weapons experts.

Iran killed protesters at ‘staggering’ scale, probe says

The UN mission also found that the Iranian authorities carried out a widespread and systematic attack against civilians during protests that erupted in late December last year, involving killings “on a staggering and unprecedented scale across all 31 provinces,” mostly between January 8-10.

“The Mission found a recurring pattern in which security forces used tear gas before firing shotguns loaded with metal pellets at protesters who did not present an imminent threat,” it wrote, adding that automatic gunfire was directed at crowds even as they fled, and some protesters were shot from behind. Three direct witnesses said security forces used tear gas to “force protesters into narrow side alleys… before shooting at them.”

The repression campaign constituted “gross human rights violations,” and also involved torture, arbitrary detention, forced disappearances and severe restrictions on freedom of expression, the report said.

According to the mission, “most footage reviewed and interviews with direct witnesses indicate people protesting peacefully,” but it also “collected independent, credible reports that some protesters behaved violently in some locations,” including by burning police kiosks, throwing objects at security forces, and “directing a homemade flamethrower against security forces.”

The probe said it could not independently verify the death toll, but that it believed the number of dead and injured was likely far higher than official figures, which say 3,038 people were killed, and 25,000 people injured. Estimates by human rights groups have ranged in the tens of thousands.

Tehran has blamed “terrorists and rioters” for the violence, and has asserted that the US and Israel were responsible.