Missile came from Russia
A Malaysian airliner shot down in eastern Ukraine was hit by a Russian-made Buk missile launched from a village held by rebels fighting Ukrainian government forces, international prosecutors said yesterday.
The findings challenge Moscow's suggestion that Malaysia Airlines flight 17, en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur in July 2014, was brought down by the Ukrainian military. All 298 people on board, most of them Dutch citizens, were killed.
The prosecutors cannot file charges but victims' relatives have been seeking details of who shot the plane down in the hope that it might lead eventually to prosecutions over an incident which led to a sharp rise in East-West tensions, reports Reuters.
The Buk missile system used to shoot down the plane fired one missile from the village of Pervomaysk and was later returned to Russia, said the prosecutors, from the Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, Malaysia and Ukraine.
It was not clear whether an order had been given for fighters to launch the missile or whether they had acted independently, the prosecutors said.
Moscow yesterday described the Dutch-led inquiry report as "biased" and "politically motivated".
Meanwhile, Kiev said that the Dutch inquiry proved Russia's "direct involvement" in the death of the 298 people on board. "This information once again points to the direct involvement of the state-aggressor in downing the aircraft," the Ukrainian foreign ministry said in a statement.
Ukraine labels Russia an "aggressor" that planned and backed a 29-month pro-Kremlin separatist war that has claimed more than 9,600 lives -- accusations Moscow bluntly denies.
Victims' families were informed of the findings shortly before the prosecutors' news conference.
At the time of the incident on July 17, 2014, pro-Russian separatists were fighting Ukrainian government forces in the region. The Boeing 777 broke apart in mid-air, flinging wreckage over several kilometres (miles) of fields in rebel-held territory.
Prosecutors cannot file charges because there is no international agreement on what court a case would be heard in.
Speaking before the news conference, Silene Fredriksz, whose 23-year-old son Bryce was on the airplane with his girlfriend, Daisy Oehlers, said the victims' families wanted justice.
Comments