The Australian War Memorial’s intransigence on depicting the frontier wars speaks louder than words

‘[The Australian War Memorial] must memorialise those 60,000-plus Indigenous people killed on the frontier in the same way as it does the 100,000-plus personnel who died on overseas operations.’ Photograph: Lukas Coch/EPA

The Australian War Memorial’s recent vague commitment to a “much broader, a much deeper depiction” of colonial violence against Indigenous people risks being compromised by an absence of detail and sound historical context.

In late September Brendan Nelson, the chairman of the memorial’s council, said the organisation had decided on a “much broader, a much deeper depiction and presentation of the violence committed against Indigenous people, initially by British, then by pastoralists, then by police, and then by Aboriginal militia”.