Or is this just a bug in IO::Handle?

Mostly yes, IO::Handle::sync requires a file handle open with write access.

The following workaround may work: 

use IO::Handle;
sysopen my $dh, "/etc/", 0 or die "unable to open dir";
open my $dh1, ">&", $dh or die "unable to dup handle";
$dh1->sync or die "dir sync failed";

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In reply to Re: fsyncing directories by salva
in thread fsyncing directories by betterworld

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