WHEN you damage or destroy someone’s property, as per the law of torts, you must compensate or repair the loss. When fumes from your factory harm someone’s crop, the failure to prevent the damage is your responsibility. The same applies to international cases of wrongful acts. Poland was made to pay reparations to Germany for unlawfully seizing a German-owned factory. Canada had to pay damages after vapours from a smelter drifted across the border, affecting American farms. States are now liable even for accidents that cause transboundary harm.
Military aggression causes the worst kind of transboundary harm. When one state attacks another and destroys its property, it must bear responsibility for the damage. Historically, societies everywhere have retaliated with counter-measures or forcing compensation from the aggressor. These practices were reviewed by legal experts at the International Law Commission, who incorporated them in the Articles on State Responsibility. “Every internationally wrongful act of a state entails the international responsibility of that state”, if it “is attributable to the state” and “constitutes a breach of an international obligation”. It is declared that “the responsible state is under an obligation to make full reparation for the injury caused by the internationally wrongful act”. A whole chapter discusses the nature of restitution, compensation, damages and satisfaction. However, the intent to claim must be declared and formulated quickly otherwise the right to invoke responsibility may be lost. Under international law, each state in a group of affected states can invoke claims for compensation against each state responsible for the damage. If we apply this to Iran in the case of the damage to infrastructure in GCC states where it targeted US assets, political consensus will be necessary. Iran can argue that an unlawful war was inflicted on it by the US and Israel whereas the GCC states may argue that Iran is responsible for the immediate damage to their property and infrastructure.
Historically, the losing side was asked to pay for the war costs of the victor. France paid a large amount to Germany in the Franco-Prussian War. Germany had to pay massive reparations to the Allied powers after World War I and later after World War II under the Paris Reparation Agreements. But all this was before the UN Charter. Post-Charter, it is not the loser but the aggressor who is held responsible for unlawfully attacking or waging a war against another state. Payment of damages did not follow as an immediate consequence. Military interventions, as in Vietnam and Grenada, were held to be wrongful but no compensation followed.
Timely claims can boost a state’s chances of compensation for war-related damage.
This changed in 1986 when the International Court of Justice (ICJ) directed America to pay reparations to Nicaragua for the former country’s military intervention and support to the Contra rebels who damaged property.
More relevant to the recent war is the instance of Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait and the destruction of its infrastructure in 1990. A specially created UN Compensation Commission processed about 2.7 million claims by individuals, the state and MNCs. Saudi Arabia, the US, UK, France and India were found to be injured claimants and Iraq had to pay $52.4 billion. Every property hit, every person losing his job, every contracting party (and there were thousands) who could not fulfil its obligations due to the invasion was taken into account. Iraq’s economy took a big toll. The compensation payments ended only in 2022 — the same year that Uganda was ordered by the ICJ to pay $325m as compensation to Congo (DRC) for inflicting an unlawful war on it and for the wrongful act of having boots on the ground there to exploit resources. In 2023, Europe established a Claim Commission to start accepting claims against Russia for the Ukraine war, and a formal register was created. The state practice now is that those found inflicting an unlawful war are being asked to pay damages not only at the state level but also to individuals who have suffered in the war.
That’s how claims from the GCC countries will begin. They had declared their political neutrality repeatedly but Iran disregarded it. In most cases, they will plead non-attribution of attacks launched from US military bases on their soil, saying that they lacked both knowledge and authorisation of these attacks.
A vast number of claims will also result from the prolonged blockade of the Strait of Hormuz by Iran and the US. The duration of the blockade will strengthen the case for compensation for business losses — from stranded ships to losses in world stock exchanges and commodity markets. The blockade is unfortunately the best enabler for cases and claims for compensation and reparations to the tune of possibly trillions of dollars already.
Several options for forums exist or can be created for filing these claims — through domestic courts in Israel or US or a future reparation forum set up by the UN General Assembly, as Washington will veto its initiation in the Security Council. Or it could be a treaty-based ‘Regional Reparation Commission for the Middle East’ similar to the European convention for Ukraine.
Preparing claims is by itself a tedious exercise and no official should come up with a speculative figure. There are states that have war compensation laws and those like Pakistan that don’t but should be advised to have one. Sovereign decrees in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE can create such laws. That way there will be statutory sanction for claim preparation, leading to a recoverable figure — which could be the liability of the US and Israel (attacking Iran and causing global trade disruption), of Iran (damage to infrastructure in the Gulf states), of the US and Iran for the economic consequences of the blockade that have hit several states, including Pakistan. The GCC states should have experts survey their losses and start documenting claims. Once these are prepared under the relevant law, the exact, technically quantified figures for the damage incurred will emerge. Thereafter, recovery will take place gradually either through formal judicial processes or unconventional means such as bilateral settlements, financial offsets, the right to use territory or certain facilities or sovereign incentives.
The writer is a former caretaker federal law minister and a public international law practitioner.
Published in Dawn, April 25th, 2026
