U.N.-backed experts allege U.S. war crimes in Iran

Geneva — Human rights experts commissioned by the United Nation's top human rights body say they 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.

The international fact-finding mission on Iran says the findings center on a pair of airstrikes that killed scores of civilians, including women and children.

A preliminary U.S. assessment suggested that the United States was "likely" responsible for the deadly February attack on the school but did not intentionally target it and may have hit it in error, possibly due to the use of dated intelligence that wrongly identified the area as still part of an Iranian military installation, a person briefed on the preliminary intelligence told CBS News.

The Trump administration has not directly accepted responsibility or released findings of a Pentagon investigation into the attack on the school on the war's first day, using Tomahawk missiles.

Iranian health officials and state media said about 170 people were killed, most of them schoolgirls between the ages of 7 and 12.

"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. It said the school in Minab was "clearly identifiable."

The U.N.-backed team also alleged the U.S. had committed war crimes in relation to a missile strike that dispersed tungsten pellets over a "clearly identifiable sports complex and residential area" in the southern city of Lamerd, also on Feb. 28.

The U.N.-backed team said 22 civilian men and women were killed. U.S. Central Command has denied responsibility for the strike on Lamerd.

The team also said Iran's state security forces had committed killings on a "staggering scale," referring to a January crackdown on nationwide anti-government protests, and alleged that their actions amounted to "crimes against humanity."

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."

The fact-finding mission on Iran, chaired by jurist Sara Hossain of Bangladesh, is made up of independent experts and was created in 2022 by the Human Rights Council, the U.N.'s top human rights body.