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No remorse...Sgt Hekmatullah murdered three
Aussie troops as they were relaxing on a remote patrol base in Uruzgan province
in late August 2012. Picture: Four CornersSource:Supplied
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Afghan soldier loses final appeal against death penalty for
murdering three Australian troops
AN Afghan soldier who murdered three Australian troops has
lost his final appeal against the death penalty.
Jeremy
Kelly
News Corp Australia Network October 27, 20144:29pm
AN
Afghan soldier who murdered three Australian troops has lost his final appeal
against the death penalty.
The
fate of the remorseless killer, Sgt Hekmatullah, now rests in the hands of the
families of those he killed and the Afghanistan’s recently-elected president.
The
secret judgment against Hekmatullah, which the country’s Supreme Court has
consistently refused to discuss, was confirmed by diplomatic and prison sources
in Kabul and also by the killer himself during a jailhouse interview this month
as part of a Four Corners investigation
into the incident.
Hekmatullah
was convicted and sentenced to death, which in Afghanistan is usually by
hanging, of the murders of Lance Corporal ‘Rick’ Milosevic, Sapper James Martin
and Private Robbie Poate as they were relaxing on a remote patrol base in
Uruzgan province in late August 2012.
Two other
Diggers were wounded.
The case
has recently been examined in a coronial inquest in Brisbane, the first of its type
involving the death of the 41 Australian soldiers killed in Afghanistan.
Evidence
was heard about a failure to communicate a heightened risk of insider attacks,
in which local forces turn their weapons against foreign mentors, to the slain
men’s platoon.
The
finding of the inquest will be handed down at a later date.
The
killer, Hekmatullah, evaded attempts to be captured after the shooting, fleeing
the base and ultimately being secreted by the Taliban across the border to
Pakistan. He was arrested in February 2013 and after months of interrogation,
during which he said he was blindfolded and could hear English-speaking voices
while being tortured, he confessed to the murders.
In
December last year, he was sentenced to death, a verdict upheld later in an
appeal court.
His final
chance of overturning or having the sentence commuted to a lengthy prison term,
was refused by the Supreme Court in a hearing some months ago.
He is
imprisoned in the high-security wing of Kabul’s Pul-e Charkhi jail, sharing a
block with former Australian soldier, Robert Langdon, who was sentenced to
20-years jail for murdering an Afghan colleague while working as a private
security guard.
Langdon,
like Hekmatullah, had been sentenced to death but under a provision under
Afghan law, paid his victim’s family US$100,000 to offer forgiveness, which
allowed the Supreme Court to commute the sentence to a prison term.
Hekmatullah
has requested the families forgive him but has also vowed to kill again, saying
he was inspired to kill after watching a Taliban propaganda video that showed
foreign soldiers desecrating the Koran.
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Today we remember,
Private Robert Poate, Sapper James Martin and Lance Corporal Stjepan Milosevic,
all three men were deployed as part of the 3RAR Task Group. On the evening of
the 29th of August 2012 at around 9.45pm (local time) at Patrol Base
"Wahab" in the Baluchi Valley region in Uruzgan province, a rouge
Afghan soldier in the Australian camp collected an assault rifle, took cover
and fired about 30 rounds into a group of
Australian's who were only about five metres away. Private Robert Poate age 23
from Canberra and Sapper James Martin age 21 from Perth were killed instantly.
Lance Corporal Stjepan Milosevic age 40, a father of two from Brisbane died
while being evacuated for medical treatment. Two other Australian soldiers were
wounded in the "Insider Attack". Private Robert Poate and Sapper
James Martin were on their first deployments to Afghanistan. Lance Corporal
Stjepan Milosevic, "Milo" to his mates had previously served in Iraq
in 2010 was also on his first deployment to Afghanistan. All three men were
based at Brisbane's Gallipoli Barracks. Their sacrifice will never be
forgotten.
"Lest We Forget" |
The relatives of Hekmatullah’s victims, however,
appear uninterested in any mercy.
“He showed absolutely no mercy to our
boys,” Pte Poate’s father, Hugh told Four Corners.
“He killed them in the prime of their
lives. They had done nothing to him other than befriend him and he turned
around and just killed them in premeditated cold-blooded murder, so I’m rather
hoping that the sentence will be carried out.”
All decisions on the enforcement of the death
penalty are made by Afghanistan’s president, Ashraf Ghani.
Diplomats in Kabul had believed Mr Ghani is
unlikely to order the execution of any of the prisoners on death row but that
view has softened in recent weeks.
Mr Ghani, to the surprise and disappointment of
many of his western backers, did not intervene after his predecessor, Hamid
Karzai, signed off on his last day in office on the execution of five men
convicted of gang rape and another, of unrelated kidnapping charges.
All six men were hanged on October 8.
The Enemy Within screens tonight on Four Corners,
ABC, 8.30pm.
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| [PHOTO SOURCE: http://teamuzunovmedia.blogspot.com/2013/09/officer-incompetence-in-afghanistan.html] |
Disgraced sergeant Hekmatullah shows no remorse for killing
of Australian Diggers
Jeremy Kelly in Kabul, News Limited Network
January 12, 2014 5:37pm
AN
AFGHAN soldier on death row for shooting dead three Australian soldiers is
unrepentant, saying he should be rewarded and would do it again if released.
Disgraced
sergeant Hekmatullah said he became maniacal after an Afghan colleague on the
base he was stationed shared with him a mobile phone clip that showed a report
about US soldiers burning Korans in Afghanistan.
"There
were some real nasty thoughts that I had in my head," he told News Corp
Australia in an interview inside Kabul's Pol-e Charkhi prison.
"I
saw that video and went crazy."
It
is the first time the 19-year-old has spoken publicly and provides a rare
insight into the motives of an Afghan security forces member who has turned
their gun against a foreign mentor.
Asked
what we would like to say to the families of the soldiers he killed,
Hekmatullah shrugged nonchalantly before he said: "I want them to forgive
me so then I will be released."
When
told that appeared unlikely, he replied: "Then don't forgive me. I would
do it again if they burned more Korans."
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At
least 140 Coalition troops, including seven Australians, have been killed in 85
so-called insider attacks, according to the Long War Journal, yet the perpetrators either are
killed on the spot or trying to evade capture, or have successfully fled.
Hekmatullah
is one of only two known offenders who it is publicly known has been caught and
brought before the courts.
Extradited
to Kabul in October, after spending about six months on the run in the Pakistan
city of Quetta and a further eight months in the custody of that country's spy
agency, Hekmatullah was sentenced to death in December during a secret court
hearing.
He
admitted to murdering Lance Corporal Stjepan (Rick) Milosevic, 40, Sapper James
Martin, 21, and Private Robert Poate, 23 and was convicted also of grievous
bodily harm to two other Australians, treason and involvement with a terrorist
organisation.
The
Australians were shot while they were relaxing or playing cards in a makeshift
recreational area at Patrol Base Wahab, in Oruzgan province on the evening of
August 29, 2012.
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Hekmatullah in uniform and armed. Picture:
Supplied Source:Supplied
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Hekmatullah's
motive had remained unclear since the incident and remains in dispute with Afghan
investigators believing he had previous ties to the Taliban.
"We have a document that shows he was with the Taliban
before this happened,"
said Brigadier-General Sayed Kamal Hashimi, head of prosecutions for the Afghan
spy agency, the National Directorate of Security. He refused to provide
details.
Handcuffed
and sporting a patchy yet thick beard, in contrast to previous photos of him,
Hekmatullah denied he was a Taliban infiltrator and spoke calmly about his
short time in the Afghan army and his view on the foreign military presence.
"I had no problem with the Australians. I could have
attacked them many times before. They came here to build schools and finish the
Taliban but instead they burned Korans."
He
was referring to a calamitous incident in February 2012, six months before the
shooting, in which US troops started to torch more than 1600 religious texts,
including an unknown number of Korans, after they were confiscated from inmates
at the then US-run Bagram prison, north of Kabul.
The
texts had been marked by inmates with extremist inscriptions but were
mistakenly later sent to an incinerator on the base.
The
incident led to five days of rioting in Afghanistan, in which dozens of people
were killed and hundreds wounded.
When
a fellow Afghan soldier gave him via Bluetooth a Taliban propaganda clip, which
referenced both the Koran-burning incident and European newspapers publishing
cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, he said he started to plot what he called
revenge.
"I watched this movie at 3pm. My guard duty was at 9pm and
I decided to wait until after then. At first I went to a guard tower and asked
the soldier there to give me his machine gun because I said I wanted to shoot
the foreigners. He refused so I went down and used my M-16."
He
fired two bursts of between 10-15 rounds each before fleeing the base into an
area of thick vegetation.
"I ran and ran through the jungle until the helicopters
came (about 30 minutes later) but thought they will see me if I keep moving.
"I decided to climb a mulberry tree and stayed there
through the night."
In
the morning, he said he spotted a farmer and approached him explaining he was
an ANA soldier who had shot some foreign troops.
"The
farmer told me to wait and soon he returned with two men who said they were
Taliban. They gave the farmer 15,000 Pakistani rupees ($160) and we left."
The
men ferried him by motorbike to another village where he said he was later put
in a 4x4 pick-up, secreted under the cabin's rear seat and was told he was
being driven to Kandahar.
"We
were stopped on the way at a checkpoint and I could hear people speaking in
English. I was told later the foreigners were stopping cars and using their
computers to check people's fingerprints."
The
trio drove several hours to Kandahar where they stopped for tea before they
switched vehicles and drove over the Pakistani border.
He
said he was then taken to Quetta, where he said he got a job as a house-hand,
earning about $75 a month, before Pakistani spies swooped about six months
later.
"I
think they caught me because I was using my phone to call my relatives,"
he said.
Taken
to court, a defiant Hekmatullah told the judge: "We are Muslim and it's
our duty to protect the Koran. If you were a Muslim, you would give me a prize
not a penalty."
He
said he asked the judge to release him so he could re-join the Afghan National
Army.
Instead,
the judge sentenced him to death.
Appearing
at times uninterested in his plight, Hekmatullah said he was willing to die in
defence of his religion.
"If I die on the way to Allah, then so be it. If someone
wants me to hang, then I will hang."
His
case will now go to an appeal court before it is finalised by the Supreme Court
in a process that usually takes months.
Any
execution has to be personally approved by the Afghan President.
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Imprisoned...Afghanistan's
infamous Pul-e Charkhi Prison where Hekmatullah is being kept. Picture: Getty.Source:Getty Images
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"The
Australian Government as a matter of policy is opposed to the death penalty and
makes its views known to foreign governments, including the Afghanistan government,
on a regular basis," said a Defence spokesperson.
"However
it is important to note, Hekmatullah is an Afghan citizen being tried by Afghan
authorities under Afghan law."
According
to the spokesperson, victim impact statements from the families of the murdered
Australian soldiers were provided to the Afghan authority to support the
prosecution of charges against Hekmatullah.
But
Defence were unaware of any requests of forgiveness made to the families.
Additional reporting: Bakhshi Bakhshi
INTERNET
SOURCE: https://www.ntnews.com.au/national/disgraced-sergeant-hekmatullah-shows-no-remorse-for-killing-of-australian-diggers/story-fncynjr2-1226800102628
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Death....Nooses hang at Pul-e-Charkhi prison, a
fate that Hekmatullah could face. Picture: AFP/Wakil KohsarSource:AFP
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God takes no pleasure
in the death of sinners, so as to delight simply in their death; rather, he
delights to magnify his justice by inflicting the punishment which their
iniquities have deserved. A righteous judge who takes no pleasure in condemning
a criminal, may yet justly command him to be executed so that law and justice
may be satisfied, even though it is in his power to procure him a reprieve. – George Whitefield, Letter to Wesley, Bethesda in Georgia, Dec. 24, 1740
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OTHER
LINKS:
Families
want death penalty to be carried out for Diggers’ assassin
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