TEHRAN - A 25-member Turkish cycling caravan has entered Iran to honor the schoolchildren killed in the U.S. strike on Shajareh Tayyebeh Primary School in Minab, carrying messages of solidarity, toys and tributes from Turkish citizens and students to the victims’ families.
The cyclists crossed into Iran through the Razi border crossing on Friday after beginning their journey in Diyarbakir, southeastern Turkey, to deliver their message of sympathy to Iranian students and the families of those killed in the attack.
Speaking to reporters in Tehran on Wednesday, members of the caravan said their mission was intended to strengthen ties between the two neighboring countries and keep the memory of Minab’s children alive.
“We have come for the children of Minab. We will not forget the killing of innocent children by the United States and Israeli regime,” the cyclists said.
They also invoked the children killed in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Vietnam and Gaza, describing the Minab victims as a lasting symbol of the human cost of war.
The delegation said it had collected approximately 2,000 handwritten messages and toys donated by people across Turkey for the families and students affected by the attack. Upon reaching Minab, the cyclists plan to donate their bicycles to local residents and students.
The group includes 25 women and men aged between 16 and 72. After passing through Khoy, Urmia, Tabriz, Zanjan, Qazvin, Alborz, Tehran, Qom, Isfahan and Fars province, the caravan is scheduled to reach Minab on October 19 before returning through the Razi land border.
The solidarity mission comes amid growing international scrutiny of Washington’s military actions in Iran.
On September 17, a United Nations-mandated independent fact-finding mission reported that there were reasonable grounds to believe the United States had committed war crimes in the February 28 strikes on Minab’s Shajareh Tayyebeh school and a sports facility in Lamerd.
The investigators found that the United States failed to take all feasible measures to verify that the Minab school was a legitimate military target, despite its identifiable characteristics as an educational facility. The strike killed 168 people, including approximately 123 children, according to the UN findings.