At a meeting of the IMO Maritime Safety Committee, Pouria Koulivand said that in the final hours of the Israeli regime’s brutal and illegal aggression against the Islamic Republic, a heartbreaking tragedy happened, which was the martyrdom of a family of nine, including a colleague at the Ports and Maritime Organization (PMO) of Iran.
“This horrific attack took place in the dead of night on a quiet residential building in a small city in northern Iran, far from any military or nuclear installations,” he added, emphasizing that “the target of the attack was a private house where innocent civilians were sleeping.”
Hamed Saber, an employee of the PMO in southern Hormozgan Province, was one of the victims of the attack in the city of Astaneh-ye Ashrafiyeh on June 24.
He was killed along with his 7-year-old son, wife, and elderly parents, as well as his sister, her husband and child.
“With this heinous act, the Israeli regime has once again proven – as it has shown in Gaza – that it does not adhere to any moral, religious or humanitarian principles. The repeated targeting of women, children and innocent civilians reveals a deep-rooted pattern of cruelty that has unfortunately been made possible with the support of some countries,” Koulivand said.
On June 13, Israel launched a blatant and unprovoked aggression against Iran, assassinating many high-ranking military commanders, nuclear scientists, and ordinary civilians.
More than a week later, the United States also joined Israel and bombed three Iranian nuclear sites in a grave violation of the United Nations Charter, international law, and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
In response, Iranian Armed Forces targeted sensitive sites across the occupied territories and launched a wave of missiles at al-Udeid air base in Qatar, the largest American military base in West Asia.
On June 24, Iran, through its successful retaliatory operations against both the Israeli regime and the US, managed to impose a halt to the Israeli-US aggression.
Israel was forced to unilaterally declare a US-proposed ceasefire after incurring heavy losses and failing to destroy Iran’s nuclear infrastructure.
