On the eve of March 9, 2020, the date of the trial in the case of the crash of Malaysian Airlines Flight (MH17) in the eastern Ukraine let us summarize the information that is currently known.
Recall, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17) was shot down on July 17, 2014 near Torez, Donetsk Region, during Russian armed aggression in eastern Ukraine. All 283 passengers and 15 crew were killed.
The responsibility for investigation was delegated to the Dutch Safety Board (DSB) and the Dutch-led joint investigation team (JIT), who concluded that the airliner was downed by a Buk surface-to-air missile launched from pro-Russian separatist-controlled territory in Ukraine. According to the JIT, the Buk that was used originated from the 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade of the Russian Federation and had been transported from Russia on the day of the crash, fired from a field in a rebel-controlled area and returned to Russia afterwards. On the basis of the JIT's conclusions, the governments of the Netherlands and Australia held Russia responsible for the deployment of the Buk installation and were pursuing legal routes to formalise this as of May 2018.
These findings by the DSB and JIT are consistent with the earlier claims by American and German intelligence sources and claims by the Ukrainian government. The Russian government continues to deny any responsibility for shooting down the plane.
The leadership of the Russian Federation bears international responsibility for state terrorism and the disaster МН17 in the territory of Donbass.
Russia seeks to remove the military-political leadership from the attack and avoid justice. Indeed, justice for Putin is only when the verdicts are in his favor, but not the other way around. A clear example of the reaction of the political elite of the Kremlin by the decision of Yukos. Russia uses the gaps in international justice to evade responsibility. According to an independent Bellingcat investigation, Putin and the top military-political leadership of the Russian Federation are personally responsible for the decision to send the Buk complex and military personnel from the 53rd anti-aircraft missile brigade to Ukraine and the subsequent downing of the Malaysian Boeing. The report prepared by Bellingcat was provided by the Netherlands-led International Investigation Team and may be an important element in proving Russia's guilt in the downing of a Boeing. According to preliminary results of an investigation by experts of the International Investigative Group, the plane of flight МН17 was shot down from the Buk-M1 complex brought from Russia (from the Kursk region, where the 53rd brigade of the Russian armed forces is based) to the territory controlled by the militants who were fighting against the Armed Forces under the leadership of the Russian military and carried out the orders of Russian curators (and they also reported on their implementation). After the crash of the air defence system, which fired at Boeing, it was returned to Russia. The investigation team also restored the route along which the air defence systems were transported. Versions about the involvement of the Ukrainian military in the disaster were rejected by investigators. Back in May 2018, the Netherlands and Australia officially accused Russia of the crash of the Malaysian Boeing flight МН17. And so, we have two main investigations that were conducted by completely different people, and which were carried out within different organizations (the International Investigation Team and representatives of the authoritative world publication Bellingcat, which specializes in investigations in this area). But, the results are largely identical and show us the same thing: Russia is to blame for the crash of flight MH17. Ultimately, the responsibility should be borne by the officials of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation and the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation V.Putin Together with these Russians, the leaders of the “LDNR” must also bear responsibility.
The prosecutor from the Netherlands, Fred Westerbeke, said that he had no doubt that flight МН17 was shot down from a unit belonging to the 53rd brigade of the Russian Armed Forces in Kursk, including because the investigation has witnessed a missile launch. Westerbeke accused the Russian authorities that over the past 5 years they had not provided assistance in the investigation. The prosecutor also said that the day after the tragedy, the Russian authorities should have said that they made a mistake, because these are the words of a rational person. But the Russian authorities are made of other criminal material. They will lie, turn around even when they are pressed against the wall by irrefutable evidence. Will transfer responsibility to others. They will begin to lie to the citizens of Russia that they are not to blame for anything, and the court in the West is biased. This has already been practiced by the Russian Federation with a state doping system established in Russia.
In Moscow in 2014, the country's leaders knew about the situation with the downed Malaysian Boeing much more than the world community assured.
Before the disaster of flight MH17, Ukrainian aircrafts An-26, An-20B, Il-76MD were shot down on the territory controlled by the Russian Federation. A few minutes after the Malaysian airliner was shot down, the "militias" in their chronicles boasted of "the destruction of the Ukrainian plane." Russian media raced about the downed Ukrainian plane until they found out that the Malaysian Boeing-777 had collapsed. news agencies were full of headlines: “Militia shot down another Ukrainian Air Force transport plane over the city of Torez in Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine,” “Militiamen of the proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic shot down the AN-26 plane of the Ukrainian Air Force.”
The Russian Federation showed some “strange foresight” and closed its skies for flights of international civil aviation from 00:00 on July 17, 2014 at an altitude of exclusively up to 16 km, which is comparable to the maximum height of the Buk anti-aircraft missile system (about 18 kilometers).
The Netherlands officially asked questions of the Federal Air Transport Agency, which did not answer why the airspace was closed to a height of 16 thousand 150 meters. Those who issued these restrictions knew that a Buk appeared on the adjacent territory, and it stands in such a way that its radius of action captures the airspace bordering Russia. Accordingly, all the corridors that cross the adjacent space with Ukraine were closed.
A few days before the tragedy with the Malaysian airliner, Russian fakes were actively circulating in the information space that the so-called “militias” allegedly seized several Buk installations in Ukraine. An operation was carried out to cover up the transfer of such weapons to the Donbass militants by the Russian military leadership.
The Bellingcat research team and The Insider reporters found that Oleg Vladimirovich Ivannikov, an officer of the Russian GRU, participated in the deployment of Buk air defence systems to Ukraine. Previously, he was a Minister of Defence of the unrecognized South Ossetia after its capture by Russia.
The Kremlin will not succeed in convincing the world community of its innocence, although it has utilized incredible human and material resources. Moscow had to admit its mistake back in 2014 as Iran did in the recent crash of the Ukrainian Boeing near Tehran.
Russia refused to admit, as it shot down an airplane in the territory of another state - Ukraine. The admission of guilt and compensation for payments to injured relatives is tantamount to admitting that the Buk was brought in with the assistance of Russia.
Already at the early stages of the investigation and the identification of those responsible for the aviation tragedy, it became obvious that the responsibility lay with the Russian side, the military aggression of which against Ukraine led to the escalation of the armed conflict in the Donbass and the transfer of part of the region to the control of terrorist groups. Thus, Russia's recognition of the error factor will speak of the actual participation of Moscow in the armed conflict in the Donbas and the sponsorship of international terrorism.
