A policeman who took part in the killings of 34 striking platinum miners in South Africa has insisted he did nothing wrong.
Speaking on the one-year anniversary of the so-called Marikana Massacre at the Lonmin mine, the officer told Sky News that he and his colleagues were merely protecting themselves.
The officer, who asked not to be identified due to the anger that remains over the deaths, said he had been badly affected by his role in the bloodiest security incident since the end of apartheid in 1994.
"It was not easy, because it was my first experience ever since I joined the police," he said.
"It was not easy to see people dying ... like the way they were dying, falling like cows ... when you shoot cows in the kraal (cattle enclosure) and they fall down."
He said some of the protesters were armed with guns or traditional weapons.
"What we did was not wrong," he said.
"We were protecting our lives and we were trying to effect arrest because those people were illegally gathered and they were instructed to get away, go to their homes.
"I am not feeling sorry for what I did but I feel sorry for those people who passed away. My overall feeling is that I think we were right because these people, they were dangerous, also to our lives."
No police were ever suspended, but the officer Sky News spoke to was among many who needed counselling for flashbacks and nightmares. One officer involved killed himself following the massacre.
Meanwhile, the chief executive of Lonmin told the families of 34 miners killed that the firm was sorry.
"We will never replace your loved ones, and I say we are truly sorry for that," Ben Magara told thousands gathered to mark one year since the bloodbath.
The widow of one miner killed, Zameka Nungu, told Sky News she felt abandoned by the government since his death.
"If I worked for you and I asked you for extra money, would you kill me?" she said.
"They just asked for extra money and they got killed for it."
South Africa's government and ruling African National Congress (ANC) party said they were staying away from one-year anniversary commemorations to mark the killings.
Explaining the decision, an ANC spokesman accused a grouping that includes the anti-ANC AMCU miners' union of "hijacking" the memorial event planned at the Lonmin Marikana mine site, which was expected to draw several thousand.
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