On Sunday the government denied the allegations, with Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab telling The Andrew Marr Show that the prosecuting authorities for the British Armed Forces were "some of the most rigorous in the world".
"All of the allegations that had evidence have been looked at by the Armed Forces prosecuting authorities because we want to have accountability where there's wrongdoing," he said.
Ihat was shut down in 2017 after it emerged that the disgraced solicitor Phil Shiner paid fixers in Iraq to find clients. But some former Ihat and Operation Northmoor investigators have now said Shiner's actions were used as an excuse to close down the inquiries.
Ihat spent around three years investigating the actions of the Black Watch in 2003, when the unit was responsible for policing and security in the southern Iraqi city of Basra.
The team reportedly gathered evidence that at least two detainees were unlawfully killed amid violence by British troops at Camp Stephen.
Despite allegedly photographing one of the men, Radhi Nama, in hospital with injuries, RMP investigators allegedly accepted the soldiers' account that he had died of a heart attack.
During the 2012 SAS raid on the village of Loy Bagh near Camp Bastion, one Special Forces soldier reportedly entered a side building and killed four young inhabitants.
British troops attend a Remembrance Parade at Camp Bastion, in Helmand Province, Afghanistan in 2009, near where one of the incidents is said to have taken place.Credit:Reuters
According to the leaked documents, he told superiors he fired because they were standing up with what looked like weapons, despite bullet marks suggesting they were sitting when shot.
The documents allege a senior SAS commander later emailed International Security Assistance Force headquarters describing the raid as Aghan-led, thereby avoiding an immediate RMP probe.
An Defence spokesman said: "Allegations that the MoD interfered with investigations or prosecution decisions relating to the conduct of UK forces in Iraq and Afghanistan are untrue.
"Throughout the process, the decisions of prosecutors and the investigators have been independent of the MoD and involved external oversight and legal advice."
The Telegraph, London









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