CANBERRA, Australia — Australia's national broadcaster has reported that Australian troops are under investigation for allegedly cutting off the hands of at least one dead insurgent in Afghanistan. Australian Broadcasting Corp. said Friday the hands of at least one insurgent were brought back to the Australian base in Tarin Kowt in Uruzgan province to be fingerprinted after a battle in which four insurgents were killed. The Australian Defense Force confirmed that it is investigating “an incident of potential misconduct” during a combined operation of the Afghan National Security Forces and Australia's Special Operations Task Group in Zabul province in April, but didn't provide details. The combined Afghan-Australian operation had been targeting an insurgent commander responsible for a key insurgent network operating in and around Uruzgan province, the statement said. “Following the mission, an incident of potential misconduct was raised through the ADF's internal command chain,” the ADF said. Australian troops are required to take fingerprints and eye scans of very insurgent they kill, if it is possible to do so. Troops are equipped to conduct these investigations in the field. The information is then compared to a growing national biometric data base of insurgent suspects in an effort to identify them. ABC did not report why the hands were not fingerprinted at the scene of the battle. The report said that an investigator from the Australian Defense Force Investigative Service — a branch of the military — told troops during a briefing that it didn't matter how the fingerprints were taken and that chopping off the hands of the dead and bringing them back to base was acceptable. The mutilation or mistreatment of dead bodies can be a violation of the laws of war. John Blaxland, a researcher at Australian National University's Strategic and Defense Studies Center, said if the allegations were true, the behavior was an aberration of the high standards the Australian military had maintained during more than a decade in Afghanistan. Blaxland said it was possible that a “temporary exception” from procedures had been allowed in the case of “a high value target.” Neil James, executive director of the Australian Defense Association, an influential security think-tank, said the alleged actions might have been justified by the circumstances. — AP
