A UN report has found “reasonable grounds” to conclude that two US airstrikes in Iran on February 28, which killed at least 178 civilians, may constitute war crimes. The first strike hit the Shajareh Tayyebeh Primary School, killing 157 people, including around 123 children under the age of 13. The second, carried out the same day, hit a sports center and nearby homes in the central city of Lamerd, killing 22 civilians, including five children.
According to the investigators, there are reasonable grounds to believe the US committed the war crime of “launching an indiscriminate attack resulting in loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects.” They also found that the US “failed to comply with its obligation to do everything feasible to verify that the target was a military objective.”
The first strike hit a primary school, killing 157 civilians, including 123 children under 13, while the second hit a sports center and nearby homes, killing 22 civilians, including five children.
The school was hit during an attack on a nearby Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps naval compound, but UN investigators found that it was clearly identifiable and was the intended point of impact. The report said the failure to verify the target “went beyond negligence.” In Lamerd, the sports center that was hit was clearly distinguishable from a nearby Revolutionary Guard building.
The report also found reasonable grounds to believe that violations by Iranian authorities during their crackdown on anti-government protests amounted to crimes against humanity. According to the report, the crackdown spread across all 31 provinces. Official figures recorded at least 3,038 deaths and around 25,000 injuries, although investigators believe the actual figures are higher. Thousands of people were arrested, while at least 58 people have been executed since the beginning of 2026 on security-related charges. Around 70 other detainees face an imminent risk of a death sentence or execution.
Source: The New York Times
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