Lord Justice Haddon-Cave officially launched the independent inquiry relating to Afghanistan at a press conference in London on Wednesday, but who exactly is the inquiry chair?

Here, we profile the man tasked with leading the investigation into the alleged unlawful killings by British Armed Forces.

Sir Charles Anthony Haddon-Cave is a judge and current serving Lord Justice of Appeal.

He will be stepping down from his role as Senior Presiding Judge for England and Wales, a role he has held since October 2021, in order to chair the inquiry.

Lord Justice Haddon-Cave was first called to the Bar in 1978 and specialised in shipping and aviation law, leading to his involvement in many high-profile UK cases including the Manchester Air Disaster in 1985.

He was appointed to the High Court (King’s Bench Division) in October 2011 and was Presiding Judge of the Circuit in the Midlands between 2014 and 2017, before his Court of Appeal appointment in October 2018.

The 67-year-old has previous experience of Afghanistan-related cases, after he conducted an independent review into the loss of an RAF Nimrod aircraft in the country in 2006.

He referred to the Nimrod Review as a precedent at the new inquiry’s launch, saying: “I came to some pretty clear findings.”