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Flight MH17 shot down: investigation suspended despite "strong indications" targeting Vladimir Putin

2023-02-08T14:56:17.373Z


The investigators in charge of the investigations into the destruction of the Malaysia Airlines flight over Ukraine do not have enough


International investigators said on Wednesday they were suspending their investigation into the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over Ukraine on July 17, 2014, as there was insufficient evidence to prosecute other suspects. .

This is despite “strong indications” that Putin approved the supply of the missile.

“The investigation has now reached its limit, all leads have been exhausted, the investigation is therefore suspended.

The evidence is insufficient for further prosecution,” Dutch prosecutor Digna van Boetzelaer told a press conference in The Hague.

Vladimir Putin implicated

The International Investigation Team (JIT) cited Vladimir Putin by name in the case: "There are strong indications that the Russian President has decided to supply the Buk TELAR to the separatists of the Donetsk People's Republic", said investigators in their statement.

Indeed, investigators have established that "the Buk missile that shot down MH17 came from the Russian Federation".

"The JIT investigation pointed to the 53rd Brigade in Kursk, Russia," the statement said.

The missile which was used to shoot down flight MH17 was thus delivered to the separatists, at their request, after negotiations with the Kremlin, a few weeks before the events.

Russian officials even postponed the decision to send weapons to Ukrainian separatists because Vladimir Putin was at a Normandy landings commemoration in France in June 2014, investigators said.

During a press conference in The Hague on Wednesday, they released an intercepted phone call from an adviser saying the delay had occurred “because there is only one who decides (…), the one who is currently at a peak in France”.

Vladimir Putin, however, enjoys immunity as head of state, making any attempt to prosecute him impossible, investigators said.

“Although we are talking about strong indications, the threshold of complete and conclusive evidence has not been met” regarding its role in the crash, they added.

A "scandalous" verdict according to Moscow

The Malaysia Airlines plane was flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur when it was hit on July 17, 2014 over the part of eastern Ukraine held by pro-Russian rebels.

A Dutch court in November sentenced the Russians Igor Girkin and Sergei Dubinsky and the Ukrainian Leonid Khartchenko to life imprisonment in absentia for their role in the tragedy.

Moscow denied any involvement and called the verdict "scandalous".

The JIT includes representatives from the Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, Malaysia and Ukraine, the countries most affected by the crash.

Trial judges in the Netherlands said in delivering their verdict in November that the missile came from Russia and that the suspects were part of a separatist group controlled by Moscow.

But they only helped transfer the missile system to Ukraine and did not fire the shot.

Source: leparis

All news articles on 2023-02-08

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