Lower House sees released images of Dutch bombing on Hawija

In the Lower House, images of the Dutch bombing were shown on Wednesday The Iraqi Hawija from 2015where at least 85 civilian deaths fell. The video, which has never been made public before, has been shown by Commander of the Armed Forces Onno Eichelsheim.

On The grainy imagesmade from an F-16, the landscape can be seen that the bombing has turned into a havoc. The explosion and subsequent smoke are also shown. The buildings around the car factory have also been destroyed.

Last week, Minister Ruben Brekelmans (Defense, VVD) announced that he will abandon the recommendation of the Sorg carrier committee to have soldiers interrogated under oath about the issue. Former minister Winnie Sorgdrager advised such an interrogation to find out how it was possible that the video images of the Dutch bombing of Hawija had lost for years. The images published on Wednesday remained hidden for ten years and according to the sorg carrier committee even ‘withheld’.

In June 2015, a residential area in the Iraqi city was destroyed at the hands of two Dutch F-16s. The neighborhood was next to a car bomber factory in Hawija. That factory was in the hands of terror group Islamic State (IS) and was the target. The Netherlands, part of the international coalition that moisture against IS, had the task of switching off the factory, but also hit a residential area. With the bombing 85 civilians were killedIn addition, hundreds of others were injured.

Two videos were made of that event: immediately after the attack and the next morning, on which the enormous damage is clearly visible. The Sorgdrager committee conducted research into the case for four years and repeatedly asked Defense to ask the images, with the answer that the videos were removed.

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