US may have committed war crime in Iran school strike: Amnesty

Amnesty International said on Tuesday that the United States was responsible for a missile strike on a primary school in Minab, Iran, on 28 February that killed at least 170 people, most of them children, calling the attack a serious breach of international humanitarian law.

The rights group said its investigation found that a US-manufactured Tomahawk missile, a precision-guided weapon used exclusively by US forces in the conflict, was likely used in the strike, reports Al Jazeera.

Satellite imagery and video footage reviewed by Amnesty indicated the school was "directly struck" along with structures in an adjacent Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) compound.

Amnesty said the attack may have resulted from outdated intelligence or a failure to take "all feasible precautions" to avoid civilian harm. It added that if the United States knowingly struck the school without such precautions, the incident should be investigated as a war crime.

The strike occurred during an ongoing US-Israel military campaign against Iran that legal experts say was launched in violation of international law.

The administration of US President Donald Trump has not publicly detailed its justification for the Minab strike but has said it is investigating the incident.

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth recently defended the broader campaign, saying the United States would not abide by "stupid rules of engagement" or "politically correct wars," and was "unleashing the most lethal and precise air power campaign in history" to "fight to win."

Amnesty said the use of a precision-guided missile suggested the target was intentionally selected. It added that the school building had previously been part of an IRGC compound, raising the possibility that US forces failed to verify it was no longer a military objective.

The United Nations described the strike as a "grave assault on children," while UNESCO condemned what it said was a double strike on a girls' school, asking: "They attacked twice… How can you justify that?"

Erika Guevara-Rosas, a senior director at Amnesty International, said that if the United States failed to identify the building as a school, it would indicate "gross negligence" and a "shameful intelligence failure." She added that if the school was knowingly targeted without precautions, the strike must be investigated as a war crime.

Democratic lawmakers in the United States have called for a thorough probe and "clear answers" from the administration regarding the incident.

Legal experts and rights advocates say the Minab strike could constitute a war crime if it is found that US forces carried out an indiscriminate attack or failed to verify the nature of the target.

The US military has said its campaign relies on precise air power and is aimed at military objectives, but has not released further details on the Minab strike.