A former soldier who suffered post-traumatic stress after witnessing fatal rocket attacks and explosions while serving in Afghanistan, has been awarded compensation.

LISTEN ABOVE: One of the former soldier's lawyers John Miller spoke to Chris Lynch

Judge Maclean at the Wellington District Court has ruled the man is covered by ACC, owing to a series of events that left him traumatised from his 2009 tour.

One of his lawyers John Miller says it's unfortunate both ACC and the Defence Force attempted to block compensation, by arguing the legislation only provides for trauma stemming from a single event.

"It's ridiculous to say it's a pity there were two mortar attacks, if there was one mortar attack we would have compensated you, we would have given you cover."

"It just didn't seem to fit within the purpose of the aim of the statute."

Miller said mental injury is a difficult claim to make, and until now has only been applied to one-off events that cause mental trauma.

But he said there's room in the legislation to cover a series of events that come from the same cause.

"Seeing people die in crashes, seeing people die in bombardments and mortar attacks."

Miller said it's unfortunate that ACC and the Defence Force took such a narrow view in attempting to deny the solider compensation.