WASHINGTON — The United States formally withdrew from the UN Human Rights Council on Thursday, one day after a UN fact-finding mission said there are “reasonable grounds” to believe U.S. forces committed war crimes in two strikes on civilian sites in Iran during the opening days of the war that began February 28, 2026. 
Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Legal and International Affairs Kazem Gharibabadi said Friday that Washington “cannot escape responsibility by withdrawing from the Human Rights Council,” warning that “history will not forget” the terrorist attacks.
The U.S. State Department announced the withdrawal, accusing the council of promoting “anti-American rhetoric” and adopting an overly accommodating approach toward governments it accused of repressing 

their populations. 
The decision came as the council holds its 63rd regular session in Geneva, which began September 7 and continues through October 7.
The Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Iran examined U.S. conduct during the war and found “reasonable grounds” to believe U.S. forces were responsible for two indiscriminate attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure amounting to war crimes.
The first incident involved a Tomahawk missile strike on the Shajareh Tayyebeh Primary School in Minab, southern Iran, which martyred more than 160 people, including around 120 children. 
The mission said the school was a clearly identifiable civilian facility with school signs, child-oriented murals and playground areas, and found no evidence it was being used for military purposes at the time of the attack. Investigators concluded the United States failed to take all feasible measures to verify the site was a military objective before striking it.
The second incident occurred in Lamerd, Fars province, where a U.S. strike on a sports complex and nearby residential area martyred 22 civilians and damaged residential buildings. 
The precision strike missiles dispersed tungsten pellets across the area, and the investigators concluded the attack was indiscriminate and constituted a war crime. 
The report said the circumstances indicated Washington acted while aware of a substantial risk of striking a civilian object, describing the conduct as going beyond mere negligence.
Washington has unabashedly rejected the findings. The White House and State Department dismissed the Human Rights Council’s assessment and questioned the credibility of its findings. U.S. Central Command separately denied that American forces conducted a strike in Lamerd on the date examined by the mission.
However, the characteristics of the missiles that struck Lamerd’s Shahid Naeimi Sports Complex still bear the marks of one of the clearest examples of America’s disregard for civilian life and the laws of war. 
The weapon has been promoted by its manufacturer, Lockheed Martin, as a long-range, highly precise system, while the U.S. military announced that PrSMs had been used in Iran in what was described as a “historic first”.
Independent weapons experts have linked the munition’s characteristics to the Lamerd strike. A U.S. official cited by The New York Times confirmed that the missile used in the attack was the PrSM and that the weapon was being tested in combat for the first time. 
Airwars, weapons experts and journalists analyzing verified video and the pattern of destruction found characteristics consistent with the missile, including an airburst and the dispersal of large numbers of high-speed tungsten pellets. 
The analysis found that civilians were killed as far as 50 meters from the points of detonation and that damage extended substantially farther.
On Friday, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung declared that his country will not deploy troops or military assets to join the U.S.-led military campaign against Iran, defying calls from Washington to support the terrorist war.
“There won’t be deployment that would involve or enter war. I can tell you that very clearly,” Lee said during a news conference. “We won’t deploy military assets in any form to that end.” 
He emphasized that Seoul has maintained the principle of not becoming directly involved in combat and will continue to do so.
Reports earlier this month said South Korea was flirting with the idea of deploying military assets to the Strait of Hormuz, which has remained under Iran’s control since the early days of the U.S.-Israeli war of aggression against Iran.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei had warned that any military presence by other parties in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz will constitute direct support for the aggressor, bearing serious consequences. 
“No sovereign and responsible country will submit to U.S. pressure and blackmail to collude in committing acts of aggression and heinous crimes against the great Iranian nation,” he said on September 7.