The Japanese company says it no longer makes the radio reportedly used in the Lebanon explosions

Hezbollah fighters carry the coffins of a person who exploded in a deadly wave across Lebanon the previous day during their funeral procession in the southern suburbs of Beirut on September 18, 2024, after hundreds of pager equipment exploded. | Photo credit: AFP

Japanese company Icom said on Thursday (September 19, 2024) that it had stopped producing the model of radios reportedly used in recent explosions in Lebanon about a decade ago.

“The IC-V82 is a portable radio that was produced and exported from 2004 to October 2014, including to the Middle East. Its production was stopped about ten years ago and it has not been shipped from our company since,” says Icom . said in a statement.

“Production of the batteries required to operate the main unit has also been halted and no hologram seal was applied to distinguish counterfeit products, so it is not possible to confirm whether the product was shipped from our company,” the company said .

It added that products for overseas markets are sold only through its authorized distributors, and that its export program is based on Japan’s trade control security rules.

“All our radios are manufactured in our manufacturing subsidiary, Wakayama Icom Inc., in Wakayama Prefecture, under a strict management system… so no parts other than those specified by our company are used in a product. In addition, all our radios are manufactured in the same factory, and we do not produce them abroad,” the statement said.

The second wave of device explosions in as many days killed 20 people and injured more than 450 on Wednesday (September 19, 2024) in Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon, officials said.

A source close to Hezbollah said walkie-talkies used by its members exploded in the Beirut stronghold, while state media reported similar blasts in southern and eastern Lebanon.

They came a day after the simultaneous explosion of hundreds of paging devices used by Hezbollah, which killed 12 people, including two children, and injured 2,800 others across Lebanon in an unprecedented attack blamed on Israel.

There was no comment from Israel. The White House warned all parties against “an escalation of any kind.”