One New Zealander recounted how he had been told that one of the militiamen got up to try to flee, when the soldier Four Corners has called “Operator K” “‘arced’ him up”, or shot him.
Not a witness.
One New Zealand SAS operator, code-named “Soldier U” by military police investigators, said he thought the firefight was over and then heard gunshots.
Not a witness.
One of his comrades believed the shots were being fired into the corpses of the two militiamen after the firefight — which would be illegal.
Not a witness.
A New Zealand SAS officer code-named “Soldier X” said he was later told that Operator K “put a few extra rounds into the bodies that were already dead”.
Not a witness.
The New Zealanders, among them Soldier U, say they then witnessed more disturbing scenes.
They hadn’t ‘witnessed’ any so far.
Three other NZ SAS members, including “Soldier T”, saw at least one of the bodies kicked off the vehicle.
Uh-huh.
Soldier T also stated that he was concerned that both bodies had been shot through the throat “as it was near impossible to have two separate wounds on each body to the throat in similar positions.”
Not a witness.
Four Corners has also obtained the confidential AFP review from May 2001, which says the rumours “suggested the killings were an act of revenge for the wounding of the two Australian soldiers”.
The rumour that Australians will shoot snipers dead is true.
Also speaking publicly for the first time about the case is Andrena Gill, who was a New Zealand legal officer assigned to INTERFET headquarters in Dili.
After the firefight at Suai, some of the Kiwi SAS soldiers who were there confided in her about their concerns about what happened.
“The only thing that they were prepared to say to me in, it was an informal situation… [was] that they thought [the Australians] were doing ‘dodgy activity’,” the former INTERFET captain said.
Not witnesses.
But the New Zealand Defence Force was concerned about possible threats to the soldiers’ safety, and wanted their identities protected.
Special Air Servicemen were afraid. Maybe a haka could have helped.
The court records remain suppressed, but Four Corners has been told the Australian military magistrate hearing the case ruled that the names of the Kiwi witnesses had to be revealed out of fairness to Operator K.
“There was an impasse. There would be no testimony from the New Zealand soldiers,” Fisher said.
In other words, they bailed.
Ultimately, investigators found witness accounts and inconclusive post-mortems did not support a murder charge.
Oh.
Operator K was acquitted of the charge and was later offered a public apology by the Chief of Army.
Oh.
Michael Smith has a good post on this.
Great additional info, thanks Petros.
This case was the first of the current practice of prosecuting diggers for doing their job. Note that for the obvious reasons outlined above, the digger was not prosecuted for murder but for the ‘crime’ (who knew?) of kicking a corpse. Fair enough that he shot and killed them, but a heinous offence to then kick the corpse. FMD. The investigation and court case lasted nearly three years before being thrown out. Of course.
It’s almost as if Covid, the 2020 election, the climate hoax and all the other woke agendas haven’t produced anything to trigger the curiousity of ABC ‘journalists’, so they have to drag up this utter embarrassment (for those prosecuting) again.
Hearsay and opinion espoused by “witnesses” constitutes evidence now?
LOL!
I don’t know about courts-martial, but this wouldn’t get past first base in a court of law, that’s if it even reached trial.
No doubt the soldiers are already guilty in the eyes of the ABC kangaroo court, still smarting over Cardinal Pell being cleared by the High Court.
I guess anonymous liars and rumour-mongers who never actually saw what they allege do want to be protected.
At least from lawsuits.
Without actually reading anything on this, kicking a corpse doesn’t sound unreasonable to make sure they’re actually dead and not going to shoot you when your back is turned.
Hell, you’re supposed to turn bodies over a certain way to protect yourself from booby traps.
Naturally the ADF will release a statement condemning this ongoing harassment of one of its members.
Any. Minute. Now.
So kicking a corpse now attracts a murder charge?
Would Their ABC prefer that ADF members confirmed that a “corpse” really was dead with a kick, or by a prod with a bayonet?
prod with a bayonet would be my preference – you can break toes & sustain other foot injuries kicking someone hard enough to see whether they be foxing.
I’d like to think I’d help defend Australia if need be from invaders (even if I am well into middle age), but there is a snowball’s chance in hell I would defend the ABC.
These snipers tried to kill the Diggers – and wounded two of them.
F. them.
The NZ SAS come out of this looking like whining creampuffs.
Yeah, if I was allotting personnel and equipment, I’d come up short for Ultimo.
I would like to investigate the entire ABC and specifically the 4corners budgets.
Lucky we’ve got good politicians who care about and look after us… eh!
The whole NZ military is quite rightly regarded as a joke.
My sister who has lived there many years told me that NZ would be struggling to field a battalion if invaded.