SAS soldier tells court he saw Ben Roberts-Smith order another soldier to shoot a man during a raid on a compound in Afghanistan, which Roberts-Smith has rejected as ‘completely false’
An SAS soldier has told the federal court he saworder another Australian soldier to execute an unarmed, kneeling Afghan man during a raid on a village in 2009.
Person 41 said Roberts-Smith walked the man about two metres until he was in front of Person 4, “then kicked him in the back of the legs behind the knees until he was kneeling down … RS pointed to the Afghan and said to Person 4 ‘shoot him’.” He inspected the body. “There was quite a lot of blood flowing from the head wound.” Person 4 handed back Person 41’s suppressor, which was warm from having been used.Before giving his evidence, Person 41 sought, and was granted by the judge, a certificate under section 128 of the Evidence Act, protecting him against self-incrimination.Roberts-Smith’s defamation trial recommenced Wednesday in the federal court after another months-long delay caused by Covid restrictions and lockdown.
Roberts-Smith is suing the Age, the Sydney Morning Herald and the Canberra Times for defamation over a series of reports he alleges are defamatory and portray him as committingThe newspapers have also alleged that during the same raid on Whiskey 108, Roberts-Smith dragged another detained Afghan man – who had a prosthetic leg – outside the compound, threw him to the ground, and shot him with a machine-gun “10 to 15 times”.