The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
of
travelling to the Falkland Islands to visit their graves. In
subsequent operations,
it became
MOD policy to repatriate bodies to the UK in all but the most
exceptional
circumstances.
23.
The MOD’s
policy on the repatriation of the dead was set out in a paper
produced
by
Lieutenant General Anthony Palmer, Deputy Chief of the Defence
Staff (Personnel)
(DCDS(Personnel)),
on 14 March 2003:
“Repatriation
to UK of the dead is to take place wherever possible and as
soon
24.
If fatalities
were suspected to have been caused by Chemical
Biological
Radiological
Nuclear (CBRN) agents, then repatriation should only proceed once
the
presence of
a CBRN agent had been confirmed or ruled out, and then on the basis
of
a risk
assessment. In certain circumstances, repatriation might require
mitigating actions
(such as
decontamination or special isolation of the body), or the body
might need to
be
officially cremated in theatre with the ashes repatriated. In
exceptional circumstances,
the body
might need to be cremated and permanently buried in
theatre.
Coroners
are independent judicial officers. They are appointed and paid for
by the
relevant
local authority and their officers and staff are employed by the
local authority
and/or the
police.
Coroners in
England and Wales had a statutory duty, under Section 8 of the
1988
Coroners
Act, to investigate deaths which are reported to them when the body
is lying in
their
district and there is reason to believe that the death was violent
or unnatural, or was
a sudden
death of unknown cause, or in some other
circumstances.16
That duty
applied
“whether
the cause of death arose in his district or not”.
Section 14
of the 1988 Coroners Act provided that, if it appeared to the
coroner for the
district
where a body was lying that the inquest ought to be held by another
coroner,
then he may
request that coroner to assume jurisdiction.
The
position in Scotland and Northern Ireland was
different.
In
Scotland, the Fatal Accidents and Sudden Deaths Inquiry (Scotland)
Act 1976 required
the
appropriate procurator fiscal to investigate (through a Fatal
Accident Inquiry)
any death
which occurred within Scotland in the course of an individual’s
employment,
or in legal
custody.17
The Act
also provided for the Lord Advocate to instruct a
procurator
fiscal to
investigate a death if it appeared to him that an investigation
would be in the
public
interest.
15
Paper
DCDS(Pers), 14 March 2003, ‘UK Forces: Repatriation of the
Dead’.
16
Coroners
Act 1988. The Act was replaced by the Coroners and Justice Act
2009.
17
Fatal
Accidents and Sudden Deaths (Scotland) Act 1976.
80