Addressing a ceremony organized by the Islamic Azad University to mark the martyrs of Minab school, Baqaei said honoring the memory of these children is not merely a tribute to the past, but a responsibility to protect truth, justice, and humanity, and a covenant with the future.
Children are the most innocent and the first victims of war whether those who fall victim to bullets, bombs, and missiles, those whose bodies and souls bear permanent wounds, or those who carry the heavy burden of losing a father, mother, or loved ones for the rest of their lives, he added.
When one speaks of the children of Minab, they are actually speaking of human dignity, of every child's right to live, to learn, to dream, and to build a future worthy of them a right that should not be trampled upon because of the evil ambitions, Baqaei said.
For many children, war continues for years, he said adding that they live with physical pain, disability, anxiety, nightmares, and a great sorrow that no medicine can cure, the diplomat noted.
On the very first day of the US-Israeli war of aggression against Iran on February 28, US Tomahawk missiles struck Shajareh Tayyebeh Elementary School in Minab, southern Iran, killing at least 175 people, most of them schoolchildren.
IRNA