Guterres 'Alarmed' by Trump's Iran Infrastructure Threat
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- Antonio Guterres is "alarmed" by Trump's Truth Social post threatening to attack Iranian power plants, bridges, and infrastructure if Iran does not open the Strait of Hormuz, spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at the UN's April 6 daily briefing.
- Trump's Sunday (April 5) profanity-laden post declared that Tuesday would be "Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran," vowing Iranians would be "living in Hell."
- Guterres recalled that international humanitarian law prohibits attacks on civilian infrastructure, including energy infrastructure, and bars strikes on dual-use targets that would cause excessive incidental civilian harm.
- Dujarric said any attack on civilian infrastructure would be a "very clear" violation of international law, though he stopped short of declaring war crimes, noting that classification "would have to be decided by a court."
- Last week, Guterres called on the U.S., Israel, and Iran to end the West Asia conflict, now in its second month, warning that "we are on the edge of a wider war that would engulf the whole Middle East with dramatic impacts around the globe."
- The Strait of Hormuz is a 55-kilometre-wide narrows between Iran and Oman linking the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Sea, described in the source as one of the world's busiest and most strategically significant energy shipping routes.
Why it matters: By publicly declaring Trump's Tuesday deadline threat a likely violation of international humanitarian law, Guterres has put the UN's top office on the legal record before any strike, sharpening diplomatic costs if the U.S. follows through. With the 55-km Strait of Hormuz flagged as one of the world's most strategically significant energy corridors, attacks on Iranian infrastructure would carry the "dramatic impacts around the globe" Guterres himself warned of, hitting a global economy already strained by a conflict now in its second month.
