A Dutch court has convicted three men linked to Russia and acquitted one of their alleged role in the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17. The men – two Russians and a Ukrainian – were found guilty of murder and intentionally crashing the plane by The Hague District Court, sitting in a high-security room at Schiphol Airport, on Thursday. All three – former Russian intelligence agents Igor Girkin and Sergey Dubinsky and Ukrainian Leonid Kharchenko, a separatist leader – were sentenced in absentia to life in prison. A fourth suspect, Russian national Oleg Pulatov was acquitted. “Only the most severe punishment is appropriate in retaliation for what the suspects did, which caused so many victims and so many surviving relatives,” said presiding judge Hendrik Steenhuis, reading a summary of the decision. It is unlikely that the three men will serve their sentences soon as they remain at large. Prosecutors and suspects have two weeks to appeal. The verdicts came eight years after the Boeing 777 flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur blew up in the sky over Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region on July 17, 2014, killing all 298 passengers and crew. At the time, pro-Russian separatist rebels and Ukrainian forces were locked in a tense conflict – the precursor to this year’s war. The plane was traveling at 33,000 feet over eastern Ukraine when it was shot down [File: Antonio Bronic/Reuters]
“Great relief” among relatives
Steenhuis said evidence presented by prosecutors at the trial, which began in March 2020, proved that MH17 was shot down by a Russian-made Buk missile. In another major finding, Steenhuis said the court believed Russia had overall control at the time of a separatist region in eastern Ukraine, the Donetsk People’s Republic. The crash scattered debris and bodies over farmland and sunflower fields. Al Jazeera’s Step Vaessen, reporting from Schiphol Airport, said hundreds of relatives of those killed in the 2014 crash were present in court to hear the verdicts. “There is great relief among them,” he said. Robert Van Heijningen, who lost his brother, sister-in-law and nephew in the crash, told Al Jazeera he was “very happy” with the court’s rulings. “I knew from the beginning that there was very little chance that the suspects would end up behind bars, but it’s very, very important to me that the judges decided what happened and convicted these people,” he said. “Justice was served very well, but it is not time to close because appeals are possible and I think [they] will be [forthcoming].” Heiningen lost his brother, sister-in-law and nephew in the crash [Patrick Post/AP]
Kyiv welcomes the decisions, Moscow says it will “study” the decisions
The court’s decisions were also welcomed by Kyiv. Ukrainian President Volodoymr Zelenskyy hailed the verdicts as “important” but said those who had “created” the downing of the plane must now also be brought to justice. “Punishment for all RF [Russian Federation] the atrocities then and now are inevitable,” he tweeted. Important decision of the court of The Hague. First sentences for the perpetrators of shooting down #MH17. Holding the masterminds accountable is also vital, as impunity leads to new crimes. We must dispel this illusion. Punishment for all RF atrocities then and now is inevitable. — Volodymyr Zelensky (@ZelenskyyUa) November 17, 2022 Moscow denies any involvement or responsibility for the downing of MH17 and in 2014 also denied any presence in Ukraine. At a briefing in Moscow on Thursday, Deputy Foreign Ministry spokesman Ivan Nechaev told reporters that the government would consider the court’s findings. “We will study this decision because in all these matters, every nuance matters,” he said. The developments in the MH17 case come amid Russia’s nearly nine-month offensive in Ukraine, where explosions rocked cities across the country on Thursday. The court rulings came more than two years after the MH17 trial began in March 2020 [Piroschka van de Wouw/Reuters]
