“This is a guilty verdict against Russia”

On September 27, the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) finally put an end to the question of the means used to shoot down the Malaysian Boeing aircraft Flight MH17. The investigation proved the obvious fact of Russia’s involvement in aggression in eastern Ukraine and the shootdown of a passenger plane. Let us recall that the plane flew from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur on July 17, 2014 carrying 283 passengers and 15 crew members. “Based on the criminal investigation, we have concluded that the aircraft was shot down by a Russian-made 9M83 Buk missile, launched from an area controlled by pro-Russian separatists in Donetsk region,” head of the Central Crime Investigation Department of the Dutch National Police Wilbert Paulissen said during the meeting with relatives of the victims of the disaster.

 “There were no other planes in the vicinity of Flight MH17. Even Russia has confirmed it,” he noted. The investigators showed fragments of the missile that had been found at the crash site, in the body of the plane, and the bodies of people who were on board. Paulissen offered a detailed account of how the convoy including the Buk launcher moved across the Russian border into the Donbas. It was recorded by a camera on the Makiivka highway and seen by numerous witnesses. Finally, the investigation established the precise location in Snizhne which served as the Buk’s launch site, and showed how this air defense system was subsequently returned to Russia.