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The following article appeared in The Daily Telegraph, a popular newpaper in New South Wales, Australia. The journalist, Ian McPhedran, is News Limited's National Defence Reporter.
Starts:
THE remains of Australian war dead are being uncovered by farmers in France and Belgium and immediately reburied to avoid red tape and delays - and there is nothing authorities can do about it.
The fields of Flanders and the Somme are littered with the remains of more than 10,800 Diggers from five Divisions of the First Australian Imperial Force, still listed as Missing in Action from the carnage of the Western Front from 1916 to 1918.
More than 46,000 of the 300,000 Australians who served were killed in pitched battles from Passchendaele in Belgium to Rheims in France.
Historian Charles Bean recorded the scene at the Battle of Pozieres on the Somme in 1916: "The whole area was flayed and pounded into a veritable sea of shell craters.
"The men are simply turned in there as into some ghastly great mincing machine."
Many were blown to pieces so the remains are often just small fragments of bone that might include nearby identifying items such as belt buckles or badges.
If a farmer reports a find, his work can be disrupted for weeks as the site is surveyed and remains removed.
Australian author Paul Daley witnessed the discovery of Australian remains by an excavator near Mouquet Farm on a research trip this year.
His guide told him he had found at least 15 bodies and that remains were often ploughed back into the soil.
He said Australia should do more to establish links with farmers and guides so bodies were retrieved, not reburied.
Defence said: "There is no feasible way to estimate if people are not reporting their discovery to the appropriate authorities in France."
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