Russian President Vladimir Putin is believed to have authorised the supply of the missile that shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over Ukraine in 2014, but there is insufficient evidence to warrant further prosecution, investigators said on Wednesday.
After nearly eight years of investigations, prosecutors are suspending their case against the perpetrators of the attack. The commercial airliner, flying between Amsterdam and Kuala Lumpur, was downed by a Russian-supplied missile over territory held by Russian proxies, leading to the death of all 298 passengers and crew.
In November 2022, the District Court of The Hague found three Russian proxies guilty of murder in absentia for the MH17 attack, including two Russian citizens and one Ukrainian.
Igor Girkin, former military leader of the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), was convicted of deploying the missile on Ukrainian territory and seeking Russian help after the downing of the aircraft. Sergei Dubinsky, a Russian soldier, was found to have helped with the transportation of the missile. Ukrainian Leonid Kharkchenko was found to have operated the missile at the orders of Dubinsky.
The court is unable to prosecute Putin for his role in approving the transfer of the missile due to a lack of evidence, as well as his immunity as head of state. Despite this, evidence points towards Putin’s responsibility in the incident.
“There are strong indications that a decision has been taken at a presidential level, by President Putin, to supply the DPR with the BUK TELAR missile system,” Dutch prosecutor Digna Van Boetzelaer said at a press conference in The Hague. “Although we are talking about strong indications, the threshold of complete and conclusive evidence is not met.”
Chain of command
Evidence from the Joint International Investigation Team (JIT), which includes representatives of the Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, Malaysia, and Ukraine, shows that the chain of command in the incident was clear.
Investigators said that no decision on the supply of weapons to separatists in Ukraine was done without the blessing of Putin, citing the fact that Russian officials even postponed the shipment of arms to proxies due to the Russian president’s visit to France in 2014 for the commemorations of the Normandy landings in the Second World War.
During the press conference, investigators played a clip of an intercepted phone call from a Kremlin advisor, stating that the delay in shipment had occurred “because there is only one who decides… the one who is currently at a summit in France.”
The JIT ultimately concludes that it was Putin who gave the permission to transfer the BUK missile system to Ukraine, with not even Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu having the necessary authority to make the decision.
Families left asking questions
In a post on Twitter, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said that the suspension of the investigation was a “bitter disappointment” and expressed regret that the suspension of the investigation was not what many families had hoped for. Nevertheless, the Dutch premier remained optimistic that justice would prevail.
#MH17 pic.twitter.com/Gaxd2SnwNU
— Mark Rutte (@MinPres) February 8, 2023
“Let me be clear: we will not stop. Since 2014, we have become all too familiar with the pattern of obstruction, untruths, and injustice from Russia and its president, Putin. We will continue to call on the Russian Federation to account for its role in this tragedy,” Rutte said.
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Moscow continues to deny any role in the downing of the plane and called the Court’s verdict in November “scandalous” and politically motivated. Victims’ families still want to know why the aircraft was shot down, but “the answer remains in Russia,” according to the head of the Dutch police’s criminal investigation department, Andy Kraag. Russia has refused to cooperate in the investigation.
The investigation is only suspended and can be reopened in light of new evidence. The facts presented during the trial can also be used by other courts, such as the International Criminal Court.
