The alleged Afghanistan war crimes that shocked Australia

The Brereton report has uncovered credible evidence of 39 alleged murders carried out by Australian Defence Force personnel in Afghanistan.

But details of the alleged killings are not provided in full – or in some cases – at all. Only 21 alleged murders can be identified while the other 18 are missing – presumably redacted.

The nature of the report means it is not possible to conclusively match the cases with previously reported incidents such as the Four Corners video of an unarmed man being shot in a wheat field.

Accounts of Afghan civilians allegedly being gunned down in fields or shot in night raids have previously circulated in the media but the Afghanistan inquiry report uses sparse military language to summarise the shocking cases. It provides no details of exactly when, where, or how individuals died.

The report makes mention of credible evidence to support the alleged practice of “blooding” where junior soldiers were ordered by patrol commanders to shoot a prisoner to achieve their first kill but it provides no details of when and where this happened.

Mention is also made of an alleged incident reported during an earlier scoping inquiry where two 14-year-old boys had their throats slit – but the inquiry report does not say if these alleged killings are part of the 39 credible cases.

It also discusses credible evidence supporting the alleged use of “throwdowns”: radios or weapons which would be dropped beside the bodies of Afghans allegedly killed for no reason to implicate them as insurgents and a potential threat.

The report’s heavily redacted chronology details 21 alleged cases where there is “credible information of murder”.

The year 2012 appeared to be the worst time for alleged war crimes with the chronology listing 17 alleged murders.

One of the 2012 cases could match an incident caught on a soldier’s helmet camera that sparked shock and outrage after it was aired Four Corners earlier this year, although there is not enough detail publicly available to be sure of this.

It showed an unarmed man lying in a field on his back with arms raised in the air as an Australian soldier trained his gun on him. The soldier is heard on the video asking his sergeant: “You want me to drop this cunt?”

The reply cannot be heard but the soldier then shoots the man dead as he lies non-threatening on the ground.

Following the program, the soldier was stood down from service and the case was referred to the Australian federal police by the defence minister, Linda Reynolds.

An inquiry report compiled by Defence at the time cleared soldiers involved of any impropriety.