Veteran Heston Russell demands meeting with ABC boss over claims of doctored audio

An Afghanistan veteran has demanded a meeting with the boss of the ABC over explosive claims it aired doctored footage of soldiers firing on insurgents, saying it was a “shocking scandal and they can’t weasel their way out of it now”.

Former Special Forces commando Heston Russell’s request to meet ABC chair Kim Williams comes as Communications Minister Michelle Rowland’s office said Australians expected high standards of the public broadcaster and conceded it doesn’t “always get it right”.

In an embarrassing concession after reporting by 7NEWS’ Spotlight, the ABC was forced to remove an online video it used in a report alleging it showed Mr Russell trying to kill unarmed Afghan civilians.

An audio analysis of the clip aired by the ABC as part of the Spotlight report revealed extra gunshots had been added to the footage. Mr Russell has since successfully sued the taxpayer-funded media organisation for $400,000.

On Monday, Mr Russell said he was seeking a meeting with ABC chair Kim Williams and wanted a parliamentary investigation into how it could happen.

He said he had supplied the raw helmet-cam footage of the incident to the ABC and its lawyers during a defamation court case.

“The ABC needs to sit down, go through due process,” he told Sky News.

“I’ve reached out to Kim Williams, the new chair of the ABC, and asked to meet with him to go through this. It is a shocking scandal and they can’t weasel their way out of it now.”

Shadow communications minister David Coleman said the reports about Mr Russell’s situation were concerning.

“The ABC needs to provide a clear, public explanation of what has occurred here,” he said.

“Taxpayers would rightly expect the ABC to provide a full and frank description of what has taken place.”

A spokeswoman for Ms Rowland said the ABC was committed to “continuous improvement” including through its complaints process.

“Australians expect high standards of the public broadcaster — high editorial standards as well as transparency and accountability,” the spokeswoman said.

“But as with any media organisation, the ABC doesn’t always get it right.”

Speaking to Spotlight, Mr Russell said the clip in question showed a member of his team firing a warning shot from the helicopter, after pursuing a pair of enemy insurgents from the air.

“This guy had literally just been on the back of a motorbike with his mate shooting at two of my teams that were on the ground,” he said.

“After the warning shot, this insurgent has run into a compound, and the drone has witnessed him bend over and pick up something. He’s picked up something that looks like a weapon.

“It’s not accusing someone of being a shoplifter, it’s not accusing someone of, you know, jaywalking, it’s accusing Special Forces soldiers of being war criminals.”

An ABC spokesperson told Spotlight in a statement that the online video had been removed “based on preliminary inspection of the audio” and the broadcaster was seeking more information.

But they said any suggestions that reporters in the ABC’s special investigations unit had acted inappropriately or unethically were “completely false” and the reporters named had no role in the production or editing of the online video.

Asked for an update on Monday, an ABC spokesperson reiterated that statement and said there was no further comment.

A US Drug Enforcement Administration agent who was featured in the ABC reporting, Brett Williams, told Spotlight his comments had been misleadingly edited.

It completely misrepresents what those soldiers were going through that day.

“Had we thought there were ethical concerns with anyone within Task Force 66 we wouldn’t have worked with them, not with any of them,” he said in Sunday’s program.

“There’s no way on earth that a group of special agents with the DEA would have risked their own reputations being associated with someone we thought was unethical, we wouldn’t have done it.”

Spotlight also interviewed the helicopter pilot, US Army Chief Warrant Officer Alan Dennis, who said he had not spoken with any Australian journalists about the incident previously.

“Most of our one-on-one interaction was with Heston,” he said of working with the Australian soldiers.

“I held him in the highest regard, out of, out of everybody I worked with. I thought he was the most professional commander that I had the pleasure of working with down range.”

Further analysis by a digital audio expert commissioned by Spotlight found an additional five shots were added to a clip used in an ABC report by Mark Willacy over the single warning shot.

“They’ve taken the audio from the six shots and they’ve applied it to this video in the news clip, and they’ve copied and pasted across this scene,” audio analyst James Raper told Spotlight.

“It completely misrepresents what those soldiers were going through that day.”

The broadcaster is accountable to Parliament including requirements that it front committees, and the Government believes that while it is rightly protected from political interference in editorial decisions, it should not be above scrutiny.