After further looking into the incident in which Blackwater security guards opened fire a few weeks ago on unarmed Iraqi civilians, Iraqi prime minister’s office said Sunday that the government’s investigation had lead to the belief that they committed “deliberate murder” and should be punished accordingly.

Iraqi investigators, supported by Iraqi witness accounts, have said unofficially that they could not find evidence of any attack on the Blackwater guards that might have provoked the shooting on Nisour Square, which the Iraqis say killed 17 and wounded 27. But the statement by Ali al-Dabbagh, a spokesman for the prime minister, is the first indication that the government considers its investigation completed and the shootings unprovoked.

Those conclusions contradict Blackwater’s original statement on the shooting, which said that a convoy operated by the company’s guards “acted lawfully and appropriately in response to a hostile attack.” The Iraqi findings are also at odds with initial assertions by the State Department that the convoy had received small-arms fire.

Blackwater provides security for American diplomats in Iraq. A convoy carrying diplomats was approaching the square when a second Blackwater convoy, positioned on the square in advance to control traffic, opened fire.

But in an indication of the legal uncertainties surrounding the case in Iraq, where the law gives American contractors virtual immunity, decisions on specific legal steps would wait until the Americans completed their own investigation of the shooting and conferred with the Iraqis. It is not clear which provisions of American law would apply in this case.