Australia is Willing to Pay Compensation to the Civilian Victims of Afghanistan

The Ministry of Defense of Australia intends to pay compensation to the survivors of people killed by its forces in Afghanistan. A spokesman of Australian Ministry of Defense has said that the government of that country is committed to implement the recommendations of the “Burton” inquiry to pay compensation, which is an important step.

This comes after an investigation called “Burton” received credible documents and evidence regarding the illegal killing of 39 Afghan civilians between 2005 and 2016, and as a result advised the Australian government to pay compensation to the survivors of these victims.

In the investigation, 57 murder cases were investigated and nearly 1,000 people testified in this case.

Earlier, General Campbell, the commander of the Australian Defense Forces, said: “I want the defense forces of the country to accept that this is something that we have to be responsible for, because if we are not responsible, we will not fix it, and if we don’t fix it, it may happen again and I can’t accept it.”

The Australian ABC news channel has reported that the requests for payment from the survivors of the victims must be approved by David Johnston, the Chief of Staff of the Australian Defense Forces, otherwise the reasons for not accepting this must be explained to Richard Marles the Defense Minister of that country.

The Australian government had sent thousands of soldiers to Afghanistan in 2005 as part of foreign military forces, most of which were present in Uruzgan province. Their military mission ended in 2016, but about 400 Australian soldiers remained in Afghanistan until the end.