The government closed down its investigation into alleged war crimes in Afghanistan, known as Operation Northmoor, before any soldier was prosecuted. But the BBC’s Panorama has unearthed shocking evidence that Britain’s special forces executed detainees and murdered unarmed people in cold blood in Afghanistan. The programme suggests there was a cover-up within the military to protect the SAS. Any decent prime minister would launch an independent investigation into claims that British soldiers, especially those of its elite units, had committed war crimes. But Britain has Boris Johnson.
The allegations date back a decade, to when British troops were still fighting the Taliban alongside allies in Afghanistan. The BBC obtained detailed military reports of SAS night raids and uncovered a “pattern of strikingly similar reports of Afghan men being shot dead because they pulled AK-47 rifles or hand grenades from behind furniture after having been detained”. It found that 54 people were killed in suspicious circumstances by a single SAS unit in Helmand between 2010 and 2011. The death toll sparked alarm among senior officers, who worried about a “deliberate policy” of unlawful killing.
