Igor Akhmetov, Rashad Likidzh, Anton Evstratov
In the Netherlands, there is a trial in the case of the destruction of the Malaysian MH17 airliner, shot down in the Ukrainian sky in 2014.
The international investigation team identified three Russian citizens and one Ukrainian who had fought on the side of the Donbass militias as the accused. At the same time, the investigation did not consider a single person from the Ukrainian side even as suspects. In this regard, one cannot fail to note a number of important theses presented by the defense group of one of the accused, which raise serious questions about the objectivity of the investigation:
1) The Ukrainian side, the day after the tragedy, managed to present the recordings of the negotiations of the Donbass militias. By the way, they are genuine, which the accused Russian citizen himself commented on. However, these negotiations were deliberately held in an open mode in order to confuse the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Actually, the military negotiations are conducted by the DPR militias, like any more or less organized army, via special secure communication channels, and not by any means via ordinary mobile phones.
2) The investigation did not take into account the fact repeatedly voiced by the DPR side – the presence of the Ukrainian Buk air defense missile system near the village of Zaroshchenskoye, where the air liner was shot down. Moreover, after the transfer of the complex from this area to the west, it lost exactly one missile. Where she went was not clearly explained either. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian Armed Forces did not announce any launches, for example, training ones.
At the same time, the investigation itself provided photographs with fragments of the Buk missile, on which you can see the number of the ammunition fired at the plane! Earlier, the Russian Ministry of Defense provided all known data on the aforementioned missile – it came to Ukraine back in the 80s, of the last century, and since then has been listed in one of the Ukrainian military units. The Dutch investigators did not comment on this fact in any way, which, to put it mildly, is surprising.
The testimony of a witness to the destruction of the Malaysian Boeing, the Ukrainian pilot Vladislav Voloshin, also does not support the conclusions of the investigation. The latter saw the moment of the attack while flying on the Su-25 of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. “The plane was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Voloshin said. By a truly strange and extraordinary coincidence of circumstances, Vladislav Voloshin, some time after testifying … committed suicide! Note that the pilot was 29 years old at that time, and he did not have any material problems or poor health.
All these and many other inconsistencies are presented in the film of the reporters of the “Ukraine.ru” project, which was not without difficulty admitted to the showing on the Youtube service. This video is marked as inappropriate there, but you can still watch it at this link: https://youtu.be/r7k7aCRvANI
All this gives some hope for the triumph of objectivity in the investigation into the destruction of the Malaysian Boeing. Even in the case of unsatisfactory work of the investigation, it can be noted that the final decision will have to be made by the court, which cannot fail to take into account the evidence of Ukrainian responsibility for the tragedy.
Authors: Igor Akhmetov, Rashad Likidzh, Anton Evstratov
(The views expressed in this article belong only to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy or views of World Geostrategic Insights).
Image Credit: AP/Reuters