War crimes allegation against African unit ‘nonsense'

Otago Daily Times

19 hours ago

Guy Percival. PHOTO: ODT FILES
Waitaki's newest mayoral candidate has labelled claims he was involved in war crimes as "nonsense".
Guy Percival, of Five Forks, announced his mayoral candidacy just days ago, including a biography that referred to serving with the Selous Scouts, a counter-insurgency unit, in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).
The special forces unit has previously been accused of killing civilians, various war crimes and being involved in the Rhodesian chemical weapons programme.
But Mr Percival, who says he is the only New Zealander to have served in the unit, took to social media to defend himself against people criticising him for being part of the unit.
"Those who have never served, and never likely too, should be very careful in having an unqualified opinion on those that have," Mr Percival posted.
"Selous Scouts was a multi-racial regiment of the country's Defence Force; 75% were African, the balance European and mixed race. All were volunteers. The pride of serving with such an amazing group of incredible soldiers cannot be diminished by the ignorant comments from those who have limited knowledge or understanding. This will be my first and last comment on this site."
A further post on the same site yesterday attracted more comments.
"I think it's very sad that people make comment without knowing," Mr Percival told the ODT yesterday.
"So, I just get very sensitive, and I think any soldier does, about his regiment, which has been ingloriously described.
"Everyone liked to blame the Scouts for everything — and someone quoted The New York Times saying something about chemical warfare. We never had any of that nonsense," he said.
"We were doing a job and, as I say, 75% of our unit was African soldiers who were actually incredible men and I'm very, very proud of my service as being the only Kiwi that ever served in that unit."
Some people had said he should have left out his service from his mayoral bio, but he did not want to do that.
"It's all over rover now ... but it is a very important part of my life."
A 1994 Amnesty International report accused the unit of war crimes.
However, there have been no official prosecutions of unit members for actions during the Rhodesian Bush War.
The opposing Zimbabwean African Liberation Army, led at one point by future leader Robert Mugabe, has also been accused of actions amounting to war crimes under today's international law norms, including forced conscription of child soldiers.
Like the Selous Scouts, there have been no formal prosecutions of Zala members.
In 1980, then-president Mugabe granted amnesties to both sides of the conflict.