The Canberra father of one of the three Australian soldiers killed in a ''green on blue attack'' in Afghanistan last year hopes the man accused of murdering his son will be dealt with for his ''heinous'' and ''cowardly crime''.
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''My views are that - I feel that he should be shown the same mercy as was shown to our three boys,'' Private Robert Poate's father, Hugh, said on Wednesday.
Mr Poate made the comments to Fairfax Media just a few hours after he was told by Defence officials that the accused, Sergeant Hekmatullah, was in custody.
After the families of the three men had been informed about 10.30am on Wednesday of the arrest, Chief of the Defence Force David Hurley announced that Sergeant Hekmatullah had been captured in Pakistan.
General Hurley said the man may face the death penalty under Afghan law, if found guilty at an expected trial for murder.
Mr Poate said the capture would help him move on after the death of his 23-year-old son in the August 29 attack. ''It's very good news. The other offenders of earlier insider attacks had all been dealt with,'' Mr Poate said.
''We knew that they were looking for him, and that he was given very high priority through Australian … forces and ISAF [International Security Assistance Force] agencies. We hoped that they would eventually get him, and I quietly had confidence that they would.
''It's a step forward in the recovery process from having lost Robbie, and I'm pretty sure the other two families would feel the same way.''
Mr Poate had no criticism of the timing of the notice, after General Hurley said Pakistani authorities had informed Australia as far back as February of Sergeant Hekmatullah's capture.
''I fully applaud the efforts made by the Defence Force to get him out [of Pakistan], and to hand him over to Afghanistan authorities,'' Mr Poate said.
''I think it would be unreasonable to expect to be informed back in February when he was only in Pakistan … he was not within their jurisdictional bounds.
''The main thing is that they've got him.''
Private Poate, Lance Corporal Stjepan Milosevic, 40, and Sapper James Martin, 21, were fatally wounded in the attack while Australian forces were relaxing at a patrol base 20 kilometres north of the main Australian base at Tarin Kowt. Two other Australian soldiers were injured.
The announcement of the capture came one week after a Defence internal review found the soldiers had only the minimum level of security protection despite the fact the Australian forces and the Afghan troops they were mentoring could not be segregated as recommended.
Mr Poate told the ABC on Wednesday there was ''no rationale'' behind the report into the incident being heavily censored.
The Defence report concluded that it was known within the Afghan National Army that Sergeant Hekmatullah had family links to the Taliban, but this information had not been passed to Australian forces.
