Panel updated: The Ben Roberts-Smith display in the Hall of Valour at the Australian War Memorial. Photo: Ian Bushnell.
The Australian War Memorial has updated the panel on the Ben Roberts-Smith display in the Hall of Valour to reflect the war crimes charges brought against him but will not be pulling it down.
Memorial director Matt Anderson said the Victoria Cross winner should be presumed innocent until proven guilty, and a decision on the display would not be made until his trial was over.
Mr Anderson said the panel had previously mentioned his defamation case against media outlets over claims that he had been involved in unlawful killings in Afghanistan, but it had stated that he had not been charged with any criminal offence.
The panel now stated that he had been charged with five counts of war crimes murder, and the legal process was ongoing.
“The memorial’s commitment throughout this entire process and the entire legal process has been to ensure that the panel in the galleries is up to date and covers the facts,” Mr Anderson said.
He said that, given the gravity of the charges, the most important thing was to allow justice to take its course, which started with the presumption of innocence.
“There’s nothing I am going to say or do today or at any stage in the Australian War Memorial that would influence or impact on the opportunities of a fair trial,” Mr Anderson said.
Asked how the memorial had come to this decision, Mr Anderson said its council decided when the defamation trial was underway that the interpretive panel would be updated to reflect the facts.
“Every time we amend that panel, it is on the basis of the facts, and that’s where we are,” he said. “We’ll update it on that basis.”
Mr Anderson said the SAS veteran’s equipment, uniform and medals remained on display and he indicated that the actions that earned Mr Roberts-Smith his VC still warranted his place in the Hall of Valour.
“The reason Ben Roberts-Smith VCMG is in the Hall of Valour at the Australian War Memorial is because of his actions in the village of Tizak in Shah Wali Kot district in Kandahar province in Afghanistan on the 11th of June 2010, that’s why he’s up in the galleries in the Hall of Valour with other recipients of the Victoria Cross, for his actions on that day,” he said.
Mr Anderson said the memorial’s position had not changed since the matter was raised by journalists in 2020, and it remained committed to telling the full story.
“Whatever the truth is, whenever the truth is known, we will tell it,” he said.
Mr Roberts-Smith remains in jail after being arrested at Sydney Airport on 7 April and refused bail.
The charges relate to incidents believed to have occurred in Afghanistan between 2009 and 2012, and involving people who were “unarmed and detained”, and either directly shot by the accused or by others acting on his orders.
Mr Roberts-Smith is Australia’s most decorated soldier from the Afghanistan conflict.
In 2023, the Federal Court found that the implications of murder, violence, bullying and domestic violence by Mr Roberts-Smith in several articles by Nine Entertainment publications had largely been proved, and dismissed his defamation case.
Last year, the High Court snuffed out Mr Roberts-Smith’s hopes of overturning the decision by refusing to hear his appeal application.
Mr Roberts-Smith’s arrest came after years of investigations by Operation Emerald-Argon, a joint effort between the Office of the Special Investigator (OSI) and the Australian Federal Police that began in 2021.
Despite pleas to respect the judicial process, the arrest has prompted some political leaders and commentators to criticise the charging of Mr Roberts-Smith.
Original Article published by Ian Bushnell on Region Canberra.
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