The British government and UK armed forces have been accused of hiding evidence related to the killing of civilians by British troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The latest allegations of an extensive cover-up lasting more than a decade are made in a joint investigation by the BBC Panorama programme and The Sunday Times.

The latest allegations are especially damning, both for the government and the British armed forces, not least because they are validated by 11 British detectives who claim they found “credible” evidence of war crimes.

The Sunday Times reports today that evidence implicating British soldiers in the “murder of children and the torture of civilians” were at first covered up by military commanders and then subsequently kept a “secret” by the government.

Much of the new evidence has been supplied by the now defunct Iraq Historic Allegations Team (IHAT), which previously investigated alleged war crimes by British troops during the Anglo-American invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003.

Additional information came from within Operation Northmoor, which previously investigated alleged war crimes by British troops in Afghanistan.

The Tory government closed down IHAT in June 2017 citing wrongdoing by senior solicitor, Phil Shiner, who was head of Strategic Litigation at Public Interest Lawyers.

Operation Northmoor was also subsequently closed down even though it had unearthed evidence of widespread instances of abuse and war crimes by British soldiers in Afghanistan.

An older Sunday Times report from July 02, 2017, claimed that members of the elite Special Air Service (SAS) covered up evidence related to the killing of unarmed Afghan civilians.

The Sunday Times reported that the SAS falsified mission reports with a view to avoiding a “potential war crimes scandal”.

In relation to IHAT, it is now increasingly clear that the main reason the government shut down the investigation was because it wanted to avoid any war crimes-related prosecutions.

The BBC’s Panorama programme interviews one IHAT detective who claims that: “The Ministry of Defence had no intention of prosecuting any soldier of whatever rank he was unless it was absolutely necessary, and they couldn’t wriggle their way out of it”.

The Panorama programme, called “War Crimes Scandal Exposed” will be aired tomorrow on BBC One.