MH17 trial starts in the Netherlands

09.03.2020 12:10

Ukrinform

The trial of four suspects in downing of flight MH17 has begun at the Schiphol Judicial Complex in the Netherlands.

Head judge Hendrik Steenhuis started proceedings, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

The Ukrainian delegation attends the hearing. Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine Giunduz Mamedov heads the Ukrainian group of the JIT.

The trial can be followed live via this link.

The Schiphol Judicial Complex, located about 50 km of The Hague, is reserved for a year to hear MH17 trial. The preliminary schedule of hearings is as follows: from March 9 to March 13, March 23 to March 27, June 8 to July 3, August 31 to November 13, 2020, and February 1 to March 26, 2021. Witnesses may be interrogated via video conference.

The trial will be based on evidence gathered by the Joint Investigation Team with the participation of the law enforcement agencies of Australia, Belgium, Malaysia, the Netherlands and Ukraine. Since 2014, JIT has been conducting an independent international criminal investigation into the downing of flight MH17 by Russian forces over Ukraine.

On June 19, 2019, the international Joint Investigation Team named four suspects believed to be involved in the transportation and combat use of the Buk missile system, from which MH17 flight had been downed. Three of them are Russians: Igor Girkin, retired officer of the Russian Armed Forces, and former colonel of Russia’s Federal Security Service; Sergey Dubinskiy, colonel of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces; Oleg Pulatov, lieutenant colonel of the Russian Airborne Forces Reserve. The fourth suspect is Leonid Kharchenko, a Ukrainian civilian, who fought on the side of the so-called “Donetsk People’s Republic.”

Oleg Pulatov expressed a desire to join the legal proceedings and will be represented in court by a Dutch law firm.

Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was shot down over conflict-hit Donbas in July 2014. There were 283 passengers and 15 crew members on board. All of them died. The JIT reported that the plane had been shot down from a Buk missile system that belongs to the 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade of the Russian Armed Forces stationed in Kursk.