A British army officer, Col Tim Collins, was awarded substantial libel damages yesterday over false allegations in two Sunday newspapers that he allowed his troops to murder and torture Iraqi prisoners of war.
The Belfast-born soldier, whose eve-of-battle address to his men won him wide acclaim, was in the High Court in Belfast to hear lawyers for the papers apologise for the false allegations.
Mr Justice Higgins was told that the papers had agreed to pay Col Collins (43) substantial damages. The amounts were not disclosed but are believed to total over six figures.
The first libel action to be settled was against the Sunday Express and its crime correspondent, Andrea Perry.
In an agreed statement read in court, a solicitor, Mr Ernest Telford, for Col Collins, said that on May 25th, 2003, the Sunday Express stated that "Gulf War hero Tim Collins" was at the centre of an investigation into an incident where one of Saddam Hussein's henchmen was allegedly doused in petrol, set alight and then shot dead while the colonel "stood by". It was also alleged he bullied and struck the unit's chaplain.
The statement went on: "The defendants now accept that all these allegations are untrue. Col Collins had not been involved in the unlawful killing of a prisoner of war; nor had he acquiesced in troops under his command committing torture and war crimes, nor had he assaulted a chaplain."
Mr Gerald Simpson QC, for Express Newspapers Ltd, said he accepted all that had been said. It was not the paper's intention to imply that the allegations were statements of fact. "Accordingly they are happy to correct the record and apologise to the plaintiff."
The second action was against the Sunday Mirror and correspondents Alan Rimmer and James Saville.
Mr Telford, reading another agreed apology, said the paper had alleged as a fact that there had been a Ministry of Defence investigation into a claim that Iraqi soldiers had been shot while surrendering to members of Col Collins's Royal Irish Regiment.
He said the story went on to allege that war crimes investigators were investigating Col Collins in relation to allegations that nine Iraqi soldiers had been murdered after surrendering.
"It was also alleged that there was an ongoing search for shallow graves, which had been used to conceal the war crimes, which were the subject of the investigation against Col Collins's regiment."
Mr Telford said the Sunday Mirror now accepted that the allegations were entirely false. Mr Francis O'Reilly, barrister, said: "The defendants are happy to correct the record and apologise to the plaintiff."
Outside the court Col Collins made it clear that, as he is still a serving soldier, he could not comment. He is to leave the British Army in August.