Targeting Iran’s Cultural Sites ‘War Crime’, Zarif Warns Trump

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has lashed out at US President Donald Trump for threatening to target Iran’s cultural sites, saying such a move is a war crime according to the international law.

“Having committed grave breaches of international law in Friday’s cowardly assassinations, Trump threatens to commit again new breaches of JUS COGENS,” Zarif said in a Sunday tweet.

“Targeting cultural sites is a WAR CRIME,” he warned.

He also described the assassination of General Qassem Soleimani and his comrades in Iraq as the beginning of an end to the US presence in the region.

“Whether kicking or screaming, end of US malign presence in West Asia has begun.”

“Those masquerading as diplomats and those who shamelessly sat to identify Iranian cultural and civilian targets should not even bother to open a law dictionary,” Zarif noted.

“Jus cogens refers to peremptory norms of international law, i.e. international red lines. That is, a big(ly) “no no”.

Later in the day, Iranian Minister of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi also described Trump as “a terrorist in a suit.”

“Like ISIS, like Hitler, Like Genghis! They all hate cultures,” he noted.

“Trump is a ‘terrorist in a suit’. He will learn history very soon that NOBODY can defeat ‘the Great Iranian Nation & Culture’,” he added.

The comments came after Trump claimed in a series of tweets that “Iran is talking very boldly about targeting certain USA assets as revenge for” the US attack against the Iranian commander.

Trump claimed the Iranian general was already attacking the US Embassy.

“Let this serve as a WARNING that if Iran strikes any Americans, or American assets, we have,” he added.

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