WASHINGTON, Oct 20: The US Defence Department said on Thursday that it would “aggressively investigate” a report by an Australian television channel which showed US soldiers burning two dead Taliban fighters. “These are very serious allegations and, if true, very troublesome,” Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told reporters.

“It is the policy of the United States, as well as the Defence Department, to treat all remains consistent with the Geneva Convention and with the utmost respect,” said the spokesman. “These allegations will be aggressively investigated and, if proven to be true, the individuals will be held appropriately accountable.”

The broadcast also prompted the US Central Command, which overseas American military operations in Afghanistan, to order an immediate criminal investigation.

“This command does not condone the mistreatment of enemy combatants or the desecration of their religious and cultural beliefs,” Maj-Gen Jason Kamiya, the top US tactical commander in Afghanistan, said in a separate statement. “This alleged action is repugnant to our common values, is contrary to our command’s approved tactical operating procedures and is not sanctioned by this command.”

Earlier, an Australian television channel broadcast footage of what it said was US soldiers burning two dead Taliban fighters and using the charred and smoking corpses in a propaganda campaign in southern Afghanistan.

The television report said US soldiers burnt the bodies for hygienic reasons but then a US psychological operations unit broadcast a propaganda message on loudspeakers to Taliban fighters, taunting them to retrieve their dead and fight.

The “Dateline” current affairs programme on the ethnic Special Broadcasting Service said the story was filmed in early October. The footage of the burning corpses was shot by Australian photojournalist Stephen DuPont who was embedded with a US unit.

Dateline said the two Taliban fighters burnt on hills above the village of Gondaz north of Kandahar were killed by the US soldiers the night before. The footage showed flames licking two charred corpses, their legs and arms outstretched, and a group of five US soldiers standing watching from a rocky ledge.

Footage showed two US soldiers reading two messages from a notebook that they said had earlier been broadcast.

“Attention Taliban you are cowardly dogs,” read the first soldier, identified as psyops specialist Sergeant Jim Baker. “You allowed your fighters to be laid down facing west and burnt. You are too scared to retrieve their bodies. This just proves you are the lady boys we always believed you to be.”

The other unidentified soldier read a second message, part of which said: “You attack and run away like women. You call yourself Talibs but you are a disgrace to the Muslim religion, and you bring shame upon your family. Come and fight like men instead of the cowardly dogs you are.”

At the Pentagon, several officials expressed concern that the alleged incident could trigger violent protests in Afghanistan and elsewhere similar to the riots that erupted in May after a Newsweek report, later retracted, said guards at the US detention centre at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, had desecrated a copy of the Holy Quran.