Secret Syrian nuclear reactor bombed by Israel in 2007 was almost complete, IAEA says

VIENNA, Austria — A near-complete nuclear reactor built secretly during the rule of toppled Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad would have been able to produce material to make nuclear weapons, the UN nuclear watchdog chief said on Monday.

Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) last month visited two sites, one in Deir Ezzor and a second at an undisclosed location identified to them by Syrian authorities.

The Deir Ezzor site nuclear reactor was the target of an Israeli strike in September 2007. Israel did not officially take responsibility for the bombing for more than a decade, in part to avoid retaliation from Damascus. But Jerusalem was widely presumed to be behind the strike, and officially acknowledged it in 2018.

In 2008, less than a year after the strike, US officials accused Syria of having sought to build a secret nuclear reactor and acknowledged that Israel had destroyed it in the raid.

In a report seen by AFP last week, the IAEA said it found that Syria’s previous government was indeed building a nuclear reactor there.