US soldiers pose for pictures with murdered civilians

A US Army "kill-team" who hunted down and murdered civilians at random took trophy photographs of themselves posing with the bodies, it has emerged.

The photo's, which were published by a German publication, show US soldiers grinning with the corpses of murdered Afghan civilians. Five US soldiers are currently facing charges of murder after it emerged that they had frequently organised attacks on civilians. There is enough evidence to implicate the soldiers in at least three murders however there is suspicions that they may have been involved in many more. The team, who were based in Kandahar province, often shot and killed innocent civilians in random but pre-meditated attacks. After killing their victims the soldiers would dump weapons or shovels next to the bodies and claim that they had engaged Taliban fighters who were laying landmines or improvised explosive devices.

The three photographs published by Der Spiegel show three seperate incidents with took place in January, February and May of 2010. Below are two photographs. They show two US soldiers with the body of Gul Mudin, who was murdered on the 15th of January 2010. The first soldier is Private First Class Andrew Holmes from Idaho while the second shows Corporal Jeremy Morlock from Alaska.

In September of last year Morlock described in chilling detail to a War Crimes Tribunal how his unit would kill Afghans "for fun" and then chop of body parts to keep as souvenirs. Morlock also admitted to the Tribunal that he and his unit had ordered an Afghan man to stand still in a ditch before killing him with a grenade.


During the trial one of Morlock's lawyers said that while Morlock might be "physically responsible" for his crimes, including actions depicted in the photograph, "the people who are morally responsible are the American leaders who have us in the wrong war at the wrong time."