“Even if I die,I will tell the truth,” an earlier witness told the war veteran’s defamation trial against The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.
The war veteran’s barrister said the defamation trial could not keep “dragging on” amid the COVID-19 pandemic and needed to be concluded as soon as possible.
Former special forces soldier Ben Roberts-Smith displayed a Crusader’s cross on his uniform while on duty in Afghanistan. Many Muslims find the symbol offensive.
The barrister acting for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald told the Federal Court “we’re not going to get an orderly two-week notice period that the Taliban is going to attack Kabul”.
A crack team of homicide investigators is being recruited to probe war crimes,including what’s been dubbed “the most disgraceful episode in Australia’s military history”.
While proceedings in the ex-soldier’s case are on hold until the threat of coronavirus recedes,the danger is advancing for three men and one woman who are set to give evidence from Afghanistan.
Brendan Nelson put up a spirited defence of the reputation of Ben Roberts-Smith,including tales of the “reverential mobs” that used to fall upon the former SAS soldier wherever he went,until the day he was accused of war crimes.
Former soldier Ben Roberts-Smith offered explanations over several agreed facts put to him during Wednesday’s proceedings.
The former special forces soldier denied that a private investigator he hired helped to “set up” a police raid on the home of one of his enemies.
A loose grouping of media obsessed with alleged “wokeness”,veterans and social media trolls have piled on to Canberra-based sociologist Samantha Crompvoets.
Barrister Nicholas Owens,SC,is recognised as being among the most skilled in his field,a gentleman interrogator and expert in the parsing of truth and lies. Former SAS soldier Ben Roberts-Smith has been trained in resistance to interrogation. And so begins the cross-examination.