US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday it may never be conclusively established who was responsible for a deadly strike on a girls' school in Iran on February 28, the first day of the Iran war, which killed scores of children.
"I don't know that they are ever going to solve that problem in terms of whose fault was it because there were missiles flying all over the place, and it's horrible what happened but there were missiles flying all over the place," Trump told reporters, according to Reuters.
He added, "Somebody said it was our missile, maybe it wasn't our missile but I have seen nothing to lead me to believe it was. I don't think it was us."
This remark comes within 10 days of Trump acknowledging that Minab school strikes were a ‘mistake' and was not intentional. He initially claimed, without evidence, that Iran was responsible for the strike.
It was first reported in March that an initial internal US military investigation showed US forces were likely responsible for the fatal strike in Minab, southern Iran.
The Pentagon has since elevated the probe but has not acknowledged any preliminary findings.
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The strike, carried out on February 28 when the US and Israel attacked Iran, killed more than 175 children and teachers, according to Iranian officials. Sources familiar with the matter told Reuters in March that the strike may have resulted from the US using outdated targeting data.
Deliberately attacking a school would likely constitute a war crime under international humanitarian law, and US officials have publicly maintained that Washington would not deliberately target a school.
The strike drew global condemnation, with the UN human rights office describing it as "absolutely horrific."
Trump has since said he does not know enough about the episode, that an investigation is ongoing, that he would accept the findings of the inquiry, and that "nobody" had purposefully attacked the school.
The comments come as Washington and Tehran continue talks under a recently signed memorandum of understanding aimed at formalising a broader peace agreement following the conflict, with the school strike remaining one of the most contentious unresolved issues from the war.
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