Australia War Crimes Allegations Explained

A long awaited internal inquiry into Australia's military action in Afghanistan has found credible evidence that Australia’s special forces, including the SAS, unlawfully killed 39 Afghans; including prisoners, farmers and other civilians. In some cases, new recruits were commanded to get their first ‘kill’ by shooting people in their custody, a process known as ‘blooding’ Soldiers would also reportedly try to cover up their crimes with so-called ‘throwdowns’ by planting weapons and radios on the dead. As a result of this report there will be criminal investigations into a number of Australian soldiers. We analyse the fall-out with Heston Russell, a former Australian Special Forces Commander, Jawad Zawulistani, a human rights campaigner in Afghanistan and Luis Moreno Ocampo, the first prosecutor at the International Criminal Court.