SYDNEY, Australia — An official inquiry was launched today into a video broadcast on Australian television showing two police officers, painted black with nooses around their necks, mocking the deaths of aborigines in police custody.

The amateur video, shot at a 1989 fund-raising party, was broadcast on national television Thursday evening.

The officers were parodying the deaths of Lloyd Boney, who died in police custody in 1987, and David Gundy, who was fatally shot in Sydney during a bungled police raid in 1989.

Prime Minister Paul Keating condemned the video as a national disgrace. The two officers were placed on restricted duties pending the outcome of an inquiry.