World

US accused of possible war crimes in Iran strikes

By AAP Newswire

Sep 17, 2026

Photos of children and teachers killed in US air strike in Minab, Iran — More than 160 people were killed in a strike on the Shajareh Tayyebeh school, Iran state media says. -AP

Human rights experts commissioned by the UN's top human rights body have found "reasonable grounds" to believe the United States committed war crimes in two strikes in Iran, including on a school in the southern city of Minab.

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The international fact-finding mission on Iran says the findings centre on a pair of air strikes that killed at least 178 civilians, including women and children.

"Following the United States and Israeli attacks on 28 February, the mission found reasonable grounds to believe the United States committed the war crime of launching indiscriminate attacks resulting in the loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects," the fact-finding team said in a statement on Thursday.

The team also said that killings by state security forces occurred on a "staggering scale" in Iran.

It said civilians were caught between "gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity committed by their own government and the nation's deadly conflict with the United States and Israel".

At the start of the war in February, at least one US missile hit the Shajareh Tayyebeh school in Minab, according to an Associated Press investigation.

There has been no final accounting of what happened.

Iranian state media have said 168 people were killed in the strike, most of them children.