02/12/2025

TUESDAY | DEC 2, 2025

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SAS covered up Afghan war crimes: Whistleblower

Arms makers see record revenues

STOCKHOLM: Sales by the world’s top 100 arms makers reached a record US$679 billion (RM2.8 trillion) last year, as the wars in Ukraine and Gaza boosted demand, researchers said yesterday, but production issues hampered deliveries. The figure was 5.9% higher than the year before, and, over the 2015-2024 period, revenues for the top 100 arms makers have risen 26% according to a report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri). “Last year global arms revenues reached the highest level ever recorded by Sipri as producers capitalised on high demand,” said Lorenzo Scarazzato, researcher with the Sipri Military Expenditure and Arms Production Programme. Researcher Jade Guiberteau Ricard said “it’s mostly driven by Europe”, although “all areas have increased except for Asia and Oceania”. Ricard said the increased demand in Europe was tied to the war in Ukraine and “the threat perception of Russia by European states”. According to Sipri, demand from Ukraine and countries militarily supporting it and which need to replenish stockpiles helped drive demand. Ricard said many European countries are also looking to expand and modernise their militaries, “which will present a new source of demand”. The United States is home to 39 of the world’s top 100 arms makers, including the top three: Lockheed Martin, RTX (formerly Raytheon Technologies) and Northrop Grumman. US arms makers saw their combined revenues rise 3.8% to reach US$334 billion last year, nearly half of the world’s total. At the same time, the authors of the report noted that budget overruns and delays plague several key US-led programmes, like the F-35 fighter jet and the Columbia-class submarine. The 26 of the top 100 arms maker which are based in Europe saw aggregate revenues grow by 13% to US$151 billion. Czech company Czechoslovak Group saw revenue spike by 193% – the sharpest increase of all the top 100 – reaching US$3.6 billion. The company benefited from the Czech Ammunition Initiative which provides artillery shells for Ukraine. – AFP US freeze on asylum decisions to stay ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE: President Donald Trump said on Sunday his administration intends to maintain a pause on asylum decisions for “a long time” after an Afghan national allegedly shot two National Guard members near the White House, killing one of them. When asked to specify how long it would last, Trump said he had “no time limit” in mind for the measure, which the Department of Homeland Security says is linked to a list of 19 countries already facing US travel restrictions. He said: “We don’t want those people. You know why we don’t want them? Because many have been no good, and they shouldn’t be in our country.” The administration issued the pause in the aftermath of the shooting in Washington on Nov 26, that left 20-year-old Sarah Beckstrom dead and another guardsman critically wounded. A 29-year-old Afghan national, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, has been arrested and charged with first degree murder. Lakanwal had been part of a CIA-backed “partner force” fighting the Afghan government, and entered the United States as part of a resettlement programme following the American withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021. Lakanwal had been granted asylum in April, under the Trump administration, but officials have blamed what they called lax vetting by the government of Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden for his admission to US soil during the Afghan airlift. Trump wrote after the shooting he planned to “permanently pause migration from all Third World countries to allow the US system to fully recover”. – AFP

o ‘Units carried out unlawful killings’

It follows legal challenges by the families of some of the dozens of people allegedly murdered by British special forces, in particular during night raids. Afghan families have accused units of the famous Special Air Service, widely known by its SAS acronym, of conducting a “campaign of murder” against civilians. The BBC reported in 2022 that one SAS squadron had killed at least 54 people, including detainees and children, in suspicious circumstances during one six month tour of Afghanistan. The whistleblower said concerns about possible “war crimes” were first flagged to the director of special forces in early 2011 but not acted on. No charges have been brought by police in the case raised by Mansour Aziz under Operation Northmoor probe, which was set up in 2014 to examine the accusations. Three soldiers were referred to the Service Prosecuting Authority, but none was prosecuted. – AFP

people,” the whistleblowing officer, known only to the inquiry as N1466, said in witness testimony. He said he came “to the view that the issue of extrajudicial killings was not confined to a small number of soldiers or a single sub-unit ... but was potentially more widespread”. Mansour Aziz, the uncle of two Afghan children seriously injured by UK special forces while their parents were allegedly shot dead in their beds, spoke to the inquiry in a short 2023 video, the Guardian reported. “Even to this day they are grieving the incident that happened to us ... We are asking for the court to listen to these children and bring justice,” he said. The whistleblower said senior officers had impeded his efforts to “do the right thing” and that he “lost confidence” in their willingness to report the allegations to military police. The inquiry, led by a senior UK judge, is scrutinising two investigations conducted by the royal military police, which is responsible for the policing of army personnel.

LONDON: Senior UK special forces leaders covered up potential war crimes in Afghanistan, a former high-ranking officer has told a public inquiry, according to evidence released yesterday. The officer alleged two former directors of the special forces and others failed to act on concerns that units carried out unlawful killings while operating in the country more than a decade ago. The inquiry, which opened in 2023 at London’s Royal Courts of Justice, is investigating the accusations about the special forces’ conduct in Afghanistan between 2010 and 2013, including the killing of women and children. “I was deeply troubled by what I strongly suspected was the unlawful killing of innocent

Pope urges Lebanese to embrace reconciliation BEIRUT: Visiting Pope Leo XIV urged the Lebanese people on Sunday to embrace reconciliation and remain in their crisis-hit country, while calling on its leaders to put themselves fully at the service of their citizens. The pope, bearing what he described as a message of peace, had previously visited Turkiye, where he kicked off his first overseas tour since being elected leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics in May. Hezbollah and Israel, which many Lebanese fear could return. Leo told officials, diplomats and civil society representatives in a speech at the presidential palace that “there are times when it is easier to flee, or simply more convenient to move elsewhere. It takes real courage and foresight to stay or return to one’s own country”. airport by children and a brass band as ships at the port sounded their horns. Two Lebanese military aircraft escorted his plane on descent. Hundreds of people standing along the roadside braved heavy rain to greet the pope along his route to the presidential palace. “The pope is not just for Christians but for Muslims too, and we love him a lot ... We want him to bless our land,” said Zahra Nahleh, 19, from Lebanon’s war-ravaged south, who was waiting to welcome the pontiff. Pope Leo delivering his speech yesterday in front of the tomb of Saint Charbel Makhlouf at the Monastery of Saint Maroun, in the mountainous village of Annaya. – AFPPIC

He urged Lebanese people to take up the “path of reconciliation”, and called on the country’s leaders to place themselves “with commitment and dedication at the service of your people”. No real reconciliation process was undertaken following Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war, and the latest conflict between Israel and Hezbollah has deepened divisions. Lebanon rolled out the red carpet and a 21 gun salute for Leo, who was greeted at the

Long hailed as a model of coexistence, multi-confessional Lebanon is nonetheless plagued by sectarian and political rifts, and has seen waves of emigration. Since 2019 it has been ravaged by successive crises, from an economic collapse widely blamed on official mismanagement and corruption, to a devastating Beirut port blast in 2020, to the recent war between

Leo told journalists on the plane that his tour had “a special theme of ... being a messenger of peace, of wanting to promote peace throughout the region”. He went on to emphasise that theme in his speech at the presidential palace, using the word “peace” more than 20 times, without mentioning any specific conflicts. – AFP