People gather outside American University of Beirut Medical Center (AUBMC) as more than 1,000 people, including Hezbollah fighters and medics, were wounded when the pagers they use to communicate exploded across Lebanon, according to a security source, in Beirut, Lebanon, on September 17, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Taiwan said on Monday (November 11, 2024) it had closed a probe into pagers that exploded in Lebanon in September and caused a deadly blow to Iran-backed Hezbollah, saying no Taiwanese citizens or companies were involved.

Security sources have previously said the pagers carried the name of Taiwan-based Gold Apollo, a company that has asserted that it did not make them. Taiwan’s government has also said the pagers were not made in Taiwan.

Taipei prosecutors, who were investigating the case, said in a statement the AR-924 pager model that exploded in Lebanon was manufactured, traded, and shipped by a firm called Frontier Group Entity, and made outside of Taiwan. They added, however, that Gold Apollo had authorised the company to use the Apollo trademark.

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“There is no evidence indicating that any domestic manufacturers or individuals were accomplices in the relevant explosions, violating the Counter-Terrorism Financing Act, or engaging in other illegal activities,” the prosecutors said in a statement.

“No concrete evidence of criminal activity has been discovered in this case, nor have any specific individuals been implicated in any criminal activity, following a comprehensive investigation,” it said.

A man’s bag explodes in a supermarket in Beirut, Lebanon September 17, 2024 in this screen grab from a video obtained from social media.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Taiwanese company Gold Apollo on Wednesday (September 18, 2024) denied a report that it had produced hundreds of explosive-packed pagers used by Hezbollah members which simultaneously exploded, killing at least nine people.

“They are not our products from beginning to end. How can we produce products that are not ours?” company head Hsu Chin-kuang told reporters in Taipei after the New York Times reported that his company’s pagers were involved in the blasts.