Iraq may sue Israel over 1981 nuclear facility attack

The Iraqi government said on Tuesday that it is studying the possibility of suing Israel for compensation over its air strike against the Tuwaitha Nuclear Research Centre near Baghdad, Arab48.com has reported. Israeli fighter jets bombed the French-built, but unfinished, nuclear reactor on 7 June 1981.

The announcement was made during a meeting between National Security Adviser Qassem Al-Araji and officials from the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Nuclear Energy held in Baghdad. The Iraqi officials discussed the ways and means to get compensation from Israel.

“Iraq is determined to sue Israel for bombing the reactor in July 1981,” said the then first deputy speaker of the Iraqi parliament, Humam Hamoudi, in 2016, “and force it to pay financial compensation for the attack.” According to Hamoudi, such a move was justified by UN Security Council Resolution 487 dated 19 June 1981, which condemned the bombing of the nuclear facility.

Indeed, in November the same year, the UN Security Council passed another resolution which insisted that: “Israel, in view of its international responsibility for its act of aggression, pay prompt and adequate compensation for the material damage and loss of life suffered as a result of the said act.”

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