UN Findings on US and Iran Underscore Why International Law Matters to Guyana

By Mark DaCosta-A United Nations fact-finding body has concluded that there are “reasonable grounds” to believe the United States committed a war crime in two strikes on Iranian soil on 28 February 2026, and that Iran’s own authorities committed crimes against humanity against their citizens. The report, by the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Islamic Republic of Iran, was published on 17 September 2026 and is to be presented to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. It does not deliver a verdict, and it does not describe war crimes by both sides. The charges against each government fall under different branches of international law.

The mission, created by the Council in 2022, examined an American strike on the Shajareh Tayyebeh primary school in Minab and another on a sports hall in Lamerd, where a women’s volleyball team was reportedly present. It estimated at least 178 civilian deaths across both sites, among them more than a hundred children. Iranian officials put the Minab toll at 156 and the Lamerd toll at 22. The investigators judged that the school building itself was the intended point of impact, rather than an errant hit on the neighbouring Revolutionary Guard compound. They found that the attacking force failed to take every feasible step to confirm the target was military. Washington has not accepted responsibility for the school strike. Its Central Command has denied acting at Lamerd, though investigations by the New York Times and BBC Verify traced the weapon to an American missile. Iran answered only about a quarter of the mission’s requests for information, and the Pentagon’s own inquiry into Minab has not been made public.

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The legal framework is long established. The four Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 emerged from the devastation of the Second World War and protect civilians in wartime. Additional Protocol I of 1977 forbids indiscriminate attacks (Article 51), requires armed forces to distinguish military targets from civilian objects (Article 52) and demands precautions before any strike (Article 57). The Rome Statute, adopted in 1998 and in force since 2002, turned these duties into prosecutable crimes. Article 8 covers war crimes, including attacks on civilians and civilian objects, while Article 7 defines crimes against humanity: widespread or systematic abuses against a civilian population, such as torture and persecution. The Iranian crackdown on protesters in 2025 and 2026 was assessed under that second heading.