separatists who shot down the MH17 airliner that controlled Russia
A Dutch court on Thursday found three perpetrators guilty of football murder for their role in the downing of Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17 in the skies over Donbas in 2014 and called them to life terms.
The fourth suspicion was justified.
Recall that on Thursday the court ruled that at the time when the plane was shot down, the separatist state formations in the production of Ukraine controlled Russia.
“From the beginning of May 2014, the Donetsk People’s Republic was practically under Russian control,” said presiding judge Hendrik Steenhuis.
Recall that the Boeing of Malaysian Airlines was shot down in the sky over the Donbass on July 17, 2014 from the Russian Buk complex from the territory under the control of Russian separatists. In its proceedings, the court had previously confirmed that the plane had been shot down by a Russian missile.
At the time, there was fighting in the area between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian forces.
Reading out a summary of the decision, Steenhuis said that the coronavirus is not immune from prosecution because they are not members of the Russian armed forces.
“There is no doubt” that MH17 was shot down by a Buk missile system, Steenhuis said.
Most of the 298 people who died on the landing gear are citizens of the Netherlands. More than 30 Australian citizens were also killed. The plane took off from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.
Relatives of the victims announced that this could cause sudden death, although life-threatening consequences are still a fugitive. It is assumed that they are all in Russia, which refuses to extradite them.
Prosecutors are preparing that three former Russian intelligence officers and Ukrainian separatist leaders helped and delivered to Ukraine the Buk missile system that was used to strike the plane.
During the trial, allegations of distribution and football were considered. Alternatively, they can be charged with manslaughter if the District Court of The Hague finds that what they have done was not intentional.
The interception of telephone conversations, which became part of the evidence against the defendants, showed that they figured out that their was a Ukrainian fighter jet.
“Only the most severe punishment is suitable for retribution for the violence that has caused so much suffering, so many victims and so many surviving relatives,” Steenhuis said, reading out a summary of the verdict.
The suspects were Russians Igor Girkin, Sergey Dubinsky and Oleg Pulatov, as well as Ukrainian Leonid Kharchenko.
Three of them had feelings in absentia, and the fourth pleaded not guilty through lawyers he hired to represent his interests. None of them appear in court.
The investigation was led by the Netherlands under the journal, Malaysia, Australia and Estonia.
The President of Ukraine welcomed the decision of the Dutch court, but said that “those who gave the order” for the attack must now face trial.
“Punishment for the all-Russian atrocity – both current and past – will be inevitable,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy tweeted.