Lebanon files complaint against Israel at UN labour body over pager attacks

Labour Minister Mustafa Bayram says 4,000 civilians were killed or wounded in the September attacks.

Lebanon has filed a complaint against Israel with the United Nations’ International Labour Organization (ILO) over a string of deadly attacks involving exploding pagers in September.

Lebanese Labour Minister Mustafa Bayram filed the formal complaint at the UN headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, on Tuesday. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, he said the attack was an “egregious war against humanity, against technology, against work”.

“It’s a very dangerous precedent if not condemned,” he said of the attacks, which Lebanon says killed and injured workers.

“We are in a situation where ordinary objects – objects used in daily life – become dangerous and lethal.”

The explosions on September 23 were purportedly aimed at targeting the Hezbollah armed group in Lebanon that used the devices to communicate.

The attack was widely blamed on Israel, which has neither confirmed nor denied the allegation. Bayram said it was “widely accepted internationally … that Israel was behind this heinous act”.

The minister added that the casualty count was even higher than first reported, explaining that “more than 4,000 civilians fell – between martyrs and injured and maimed – in a few minutes by this attack.”

‘Contrary to decent work principles’

During a press conference in Geneva, Bayram was asked why he opted to file the complaint at the ILO, to which he replied that the workers who were harmed in the explosions were on the job.

“We deemed it necessary to point out that this runs contrary to work environment, security and safety, contrary to decent work principles … defended by the ILO,” he said.

He added that the Lebanese authorities could still file complaints about pager attacks in other international forums, including the World Trade Organization (WTO).

With the attack on the pagers in September, Israel began a more intense war on Lebanon.

Hezbollah and the Israeli army had already been trading attacks since the start of Israel’s war on Gaza in October 2023.

A week after the pager attack, Israel announced a ground operation in southern Lebanon as well as heavy air strikes on areas in Beirut’s southern suburbs and the eastern Bekaa Valley.

So far, more than 3,000 people have been killed in Lebanon and 13,492 injured since last October, according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health.

More than a million people have also been displaced due to Israel’s attacks on Lebanon.

In the latest attacks on Wednesday, Israeli strikes killed at least 30 people in Baalbek in the Bekaa Valley, according to the regional governor, while more strikes hit Beirut’s southern suburbs.

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Al Jazeera and news agencies