Ministers have denied a “cover-up” of alleged war crimes involving the torture and murder of innocent civilians by British soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Military detectives have reportedly probed a 2012 SAS raid on a compound in Helmand Province where three “unarmed” children and a young man were shot dead, as well as the alleged “daily” abuse of prisoners by the Black Watch regiment in Basra in 2003, and the fatal shooting of an Iraqi policeman in the same year.

According to BBC Panorama and The Sunday Times, leaked documents indicate the incidents were then covered up by senior officers and only cursorily interrogated by the Royal Military Police (RMP).

Investigators on the Iraq Historic Allegations Team (IHAT) and Operation Northmoor - for Afghanistan - were then put under pressure by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to wind up the inquiries, the media outlets claim.

Yesterday the government denied allegations of a cover-up, with Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab telling Andrew Marr that the prosecuting authorities for the British armed forces are “some of the most rigorous in the world”.

"All of the allegations that had evidence have been looked at by the armed forces prosecuting authorities because we want to have accountability where there's wrongdoing,” he said.