AP: Germany Ends Probe Against 2 Soldiers (Afghanistan photos)

[Eugene]

Germany Ends Probe Against 2 Soldiers


Thursday December 7, 2006 1:31 PM

BERLIN (AP) - Prosecutors on Thursday dropped their investigation of two
German soldiers who posed for photos with a skull they found in Afghanistan.

Prosecutor Ruediger Hoedl said that the soldiers' actions did not rise to the
level of the crime of disturbing the peace of the dead.

The soldiers found the skull and other bones in 2003 in a place long used as a
residential area by Afghans, Hoedl said. Only if the remains had been removed
from a cemetery would the act have constituted a prosecutable crime, he said.

Several sets of the pictures of German soldiers posing with the skull and other
bones surfaced in October, provoking disgust in Germany and Afghanistan and
concern that their publication could prompt attacks on German troops in
Afghanistan.

Several others soldiers were suspended in the course of the army's own
investigation.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6264521,00.html

[Kagemusha]

1. So guilty only of bad taste.

But hey, the investigation got political points so it's not wasted money, right?