In Afghanistan, British special forces will have special forces report on eyewitnesses

The BBC documentary program program panorama broadcast Special units: I saw war crimesis available for BBC IPlayer for the next 11 months.

A team of reporters has been examining illegal murders of British armed forces in Afghanistan for several years and produces an important episode. Sas Death Squads exposes: a British war crime? In July 2022, which forced the government to call up an investigation the following October.

Special forces: I saw war crimes, screenshot from the BBC website [Photo: bbc.co.uk]

The latest program is based on discussions with more than 30 sources that worked during the crew led by the USA with the British special units in Afghanistan. Your words are spoken by the actors to prevent identification and retaliation.

Her certificate describes the murder of unarmed Afghans in her sleep; the execution of handcuffs in prisoners, including children; Psychotic raids; Personal Kill Tallies; And the systematic cover -up of all stressful evidence, including the deletion of files and the completion of examinations.

Crimes took place over more than a decade, much longer than the three-year period (2010-2013), which was examined by the persistent independent examination of Afghanistan, which was opened in London in October 2023.

With regard to the largely simultaneous invasion and occupation of Iraq from 2003, the witnesses informed the program that the Special Air Service (SAS) had already developed a method in order to cover up illegal murders in Iraq by planting weapons (known as “drop weapons”) on the bodies of their victims so that they look like armed chambers.

This method was routine in Afghanistan. A veteran told panorama“They searched someone, captivate him and then shoot” [before removing the handcuffs] And “a pistol plants” on the body.

A source that had served with the SAS [AK-47 rifles]. Due to the way they are laid out for folding, they were easier to carry in daily bags, and easier to the targets and plants of the body so that it looks like the person holds a rifle when they were shot. “

Another source that had served with the SAS said bluntly: “Everyone knew what was going on … so there was implicit approval for what happened.”

According to sources, more junior members of Sturz teams from more high -ranking SAS operators were communicated that they should kill male prisoners.

Children were not available.

The Special Boat Service (SBS) is also involved in executions of unarmed and injured Afghans for the first time panorama Conversation with at least 10 sources that served with or next to the regiment.

One of these said that wounded fighters were routinely killed and an operation was described when an Afghan was shot, but still breathed: “The doctor stood over him and treated his injury. Then one of our guys came up to him. Murder.”

A veteran who served with the SBS said that some troops had a “mob mentality” and described their behavior towards operations as “barbaric” and expressed “serious psychopathic features”.

A former intelligence officer who was attached to the SBS described the doctorate of Operation Accounts: “They could see from the photographs that were taken on site that the accounts given by the SBS boys to justify certain murders.

panorama could also speak to former members of the Afghan special units (ASF), which served together with the SBS around 2020. It was told about an operation in which his British mentors shot a boy of 13 or 14. His squad should “destroy all evidence of what happened that night”.

The narrator Richard Bilton explains: “The same squadron that kept a kill in Iraq in Iraq. In Afghanistan, an average of 2.7 people were killed in every operation. Hundreds were killed.”

A former intelligence officer who was connected to the SAS confirmed the following: “It was only about the statistics. When the numbers at the morning meeting in the NATO headquarters were read out, they wanted the SAS -Sksk Force to have a high figure. It was considered a metric of success.”

Witnesses tell of a member of a SAS squadron who personally killed dozens of Afghans on a single tour. A Veteran of the SAS said: “It seemed like trying to get a kill at every operation … he was notorous in the squadron. He really seemed … like a psychopath.”

In an incident in which sources in the SAS were notorious, the soldier opened the throat of an injured Afghan after telling an officer that he should not shoot the man again: “Because he wanted to end the wounded with his knife.”

Another witness who said that “many psychotic murderers” were described among the SAS: “In some operations, the troops in the Guesthouse type and killed everyone there … they went in and shoot everyone who slept there.”

panorama Also examined the methods with which these crimes are covered up. According to the certificate, the officials would help falsify postoperative reports. One of the veterans said: “We understood how to write down serious reviews in the incidents. If it looked as if a shootout could be a violation of the conflict rules, they receive a call from the legal advisor or one of the employee officials in HQ. “Oh yes, I'm doing that now.” Something like that.

Secret service officers who observed the operations in live drones -and so as war crimes were seen in real time were asked to “dig” data about victims in order to subsequently connect them to the Taliban.

The program pointed to Operation Nortmoor, an investigation by the Royal Military Police in 2014 on allegations of over 600 crimes by British armed forces in Afghanistan, including the murder of children. The investigation was terminated in 2019 without prosecution, despite the proven permanent deletion of evidence by the special units.

panorama For the first time, the then conservative prime minister David Cameron was repeatedly warned during his tenure that the British special units killed civilians in Afghanistan.

Bilton says: “Seniors were told about the murders, but they were not stopped. We found indications of a widespread cover -up that was permanent years. The cover -up began with special units on site. Some of the leading officers were continued by the UK and was maintained by political and the Ministry of Defense.”

A Cameron spokesman was forced to respond to it panoramaBy saying: “Every suggestion that Lord Cameron worked together to cover up allegations for serious criminal misconduct is total nonsense.”

Bruce Houlder KC, a former director of service, informed the program that the public investigation would examine the extent of Lord Cameron's knowledge of alleged civilian victims after operations of the British special units.

The following is charged with full accomplice; General Sir Gwyn Jenkins, head of the British Special Forces in Afghanistan for a year 2011 and former director of Special Forces; General Sir Mark Carleton-Smith, the former head of the British army; And Lieutenant General Jonathon Page, another former director special units.

The last segment of the panorama The program deals with the Veto of the British special units of over 2,000 asylum sayings of former members of the Afghan special units (ASF), which may be appointed to provide evidence of war crimes in the ongoing London examination. A former ASF member concluded: “You don't want us in Great Britain because we saw what we saw.”

The program showed that the person who monitors this mass depression of asylum applications was Gwyn Jenkins. Special units: I saw war crimes was broadcast on Monday, May 12th. On May 15, the Ministry of Defense promoted the Labor Government Jenkins to First Sea Lord and head of the marine tab, head of the British Royal Navy.

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