Statement on the anniversary of MH17 tragedy
Ten years ago the Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, crashed in the skies over Donbass taking lives of 298 people.
We express our condolences to the families and friends of those who lost life in this plane crash.
We regret to note that over the time the high degree of politicization of the MH17 case has not allowed to conduct full, thorough and independent international investigations, as required by the UN Security Council Resolution 2166. The true circumstances of the tragedy have still not been established.
The technical investigation of the Dutch Security Council and the criminal investigation of the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) initiated by the Netherlands did not meet the criteria set out in the UN Security Council resolution. Our country was deprived of the opportunity to fully participate in those investigations. The huge amount of data provided by Russia was not taken into account. At the same time, the JIT included states not only directly interested in the outcome of the investigation due to their involvement in the incident, but also those politically engaged against Russia, i.e. Australia, Belgium, Malaysia, the Netherlands and Ukraine.
The criteria initially set by the Netherlands and its allies for the aforementioned investigations did not meet even the minimum requirements in terms of objectivity. As a result, the conclusions obtained this way contain a significant number of inaccuracies and inconsistencies, and many questions directly related to the circumstances of the disaster still remain open.
Initially the Netherlands used their dubious developments in the MH17 case in The Hague District Court during the trial against three Russian citizens, I.Girkin, S.Dubinsky and O.Pulatov, as well as a citizen of Ukraine, L.Kharchenko. The same materials now form the basis of proceedings before the ICAO Council and the ECHR.
We have no doubt that the Netherlands, Australia and the countries that have joined them guided by political considerations are seeking by any means to impose on the world community their pre-selected version of the Boeing plane crash according to which the blame would be placed on Russia. At the same time a whole number of facts directly contradicting these statements are being ignored. Given the initial openly anti-Russian sentiment of the participants of these proceedings, there is no doubt about the final results. Decisions like that will have nothing to do with establishing the truth.
It can not be explained why over the past ten years not a single question was addressed to Ukraine, which refused to provide radar data and recordings of flight tracking services’ conversations. Neither could it explain the disappearance of Ukrainian air traffic controllers who were working on that day and could have shed light on the circumstances of the tragedy. The issue of Kiev’s responsibility for not closing the airspace over the zone of hostilities, where the air defense systems of the Ukrainian armed forces including Buks were deployed, also was not properly analyzed.
Over the past ten years the issue of Ukraine not closing the airspace over the armed conflict zone in Donbass has been repeatedly raised in the Netherlands, including by parliamentarians. Thus, back in October 2019, members of the Second Chamber of the States General of the Netherlands initiated an appeal to the Government demanding to conduct an appropriate investigation. However the initiative was effectively put on hold, and no answer to the question was ever presented. To this day, the Dutch authorities stubbornly avoid discussing this topic, pretending that it has no relevance in this matter.
Ten years after the tragedy in the skies over Donbass took place, it is obvious that during the investigation of the crash the Hague has been consistently shielding the Kiev authorities, deliberately ignoring any facts that would indicate the latter’s responsibility for the disaster. This approach does not serve to establish the truth, but only leads to further politicization of the matter.
We resolutely declare that the Russian Federation was not involved in the crash of flight MH17. All statements to the contrary are false. Russia remains committed to the UN Security Council Resolution 2166 and to establishing the true causes of the MH17 plane crash.
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