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Australia probes E. Timor war crime claims
By Grant Holloway, CNN Sydney
CANBERRA, Australia (CNN) -- The Australian Army is investigating claims that its special forces troops may have tortured and executed militiamen following a gunbattle in East Timor two years ago. The United Nations has exhumed the two men from a graveyard in the East Timorese capital of Dili and a forensic examination will be undertaken to discover exactly how the men died. More than 100 militiamen were captured and two were killed during the battle with Australian Special Air Services forces which ensued after a convoy was ambushed on October 6, 1999. Newspaper reports in Australia Thursday say military investigators are looking into allegations one of the militiamen was shot in the back of the head by a pistol at point blank range. Queensland's Courier Mail newspaper also reports that charges of torture and maltreatment of militiamen captured the same day by the SAS are also being probed. Director of personnel operations Colonel Terry McCullagh said Thursday the army had been conducting "a comprehensive investigation into these serious allegations for the last two years". "No stone will be left unturned to ensure that a thorough investigation is conducted," McCullagh said in a statement to media. "If there is a case to answer by any soldier they will face the military justice system and will be given a fair and just hearing." McCullagh earlier told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that the bodies had not been exhumed at the army's request. Exhuming bodiesRather, the U.N. said it was exhuming all bodies of those killed over the last two years as a routine matter so the army decided to take the opportunity to conduct a forensic examination. That examination has not yet been conducted but will be carried out "soon". He said that at this stage he did not have any evidence to charge anyone nor to have ordered an independent exhumation of the bodies. Despite serious decomposition, it is believed the examiners should be able to piece enough evidence from bone examinations to confirm some of the circumstances of the shooting, the Courier Mail reports. More than 4000 Australian troops led a United Nations peacekeeping force to East Timor in September 1999 after Indonesian-military backed militiamen went on a murderous rampage in the former Indonesian province. The bloodshed -- which laid waste to Dili and killed more than 1,000 people -- was prompted by a referendum in which the East Timorese overwhelmingly voted for independence from Indonesia which annexed the territory in 1975.
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