Release of MH17 report resumes international blame game
World
Release of MH17 report resumes international blame game
A formal investigation concluded today that Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was shot down by a Russian-made BUK missile fired over war-torn Ukraine, but 15 months after the disaster, Russia and the West remain locked in a bitter blame game. The independent investigation, led by Dutch officials, did not identify who launched the missile that crashed into the Boeing 777 on July 17, 2014, killing all 298 people on board. But Russia, Ukraine and Western nations all seized the moment to step up accusations that the fault for the tragedy lay at someone else’s door.
It’s an area where the borders have fluctuated a lot, but it’s a territory where the pro-Russian rebels have laid down the law.
Tjibbe Joustra, chairman of the Dutch Safety Board
The White House, which has long accused pro-Russian rebels of being behind the attack, believed the report to be a reinforcement to its initial assessment of the crash, while Moscow reacted angrily saying it had “serious doubts” about the goal of an investigation conducted in the Netherlands, adding it was merely “a justification of accusations that were put forward before.”
I personally have no doubt that this was a planned operation of the Russian special services aimed at downing a civilian aircraft.
Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk
