According to Western media reports, an international team of investigators said on Thursday that a Russian military missile was responsible for shooting down flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine in 2014
The Guardian says investigators point the finger directly at Moscow for the first time.
The Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 was travelling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur when it was shot down over the conflict zone in eastern Ukraine on 17 July 2014. All 298 people onboard were killed.
In 2016, investigators announced they had evidence that the BUK system involved in the incident had crossed the border into eastern Ukraine from Russia and returned after the plane had been shot down.
At a press conference in The Hague on Thursday, the investigators showed photo and video evidence that they said proved they had identified the specific BUK missile system responsible.
They said they had “legal and convincing evidence which will stand up in a courtroom” that the BUK system involved came from the 53rd anti-aircraft missile brigade based in Kursk, in western Russia.
Previously, the investigative website Bellingcat has pointed to involvement of the same brigade using open-source information.
The joint investigation team (JIT) looking into the incident is made up of Dutch prosecutors and police and others from Australia, Malaysia and Ukraine. They showed photos and video of the convoy that carried the missile system over the border from Russia to Ukraine, and a series of distinctive markings and serial numbers which they said had enabled them to trace the exact system used in the attack, and trace it to the 53rd brigade.
Meanwhile, Russian officials have denied all involvement in the incident, according to TASS. Russia’s Defense Ministry yesterday released a statement noting that no Russian missile had ever crossed into Ukraine.
“Russia’s Defense Ministry rejected both in the first hours after the tragedy and subsequently the Ukrainian side’s insinuations on the alleged involvement of Russian servicemen in the air crash over Ukraine and delivered the corresponding evidence to the Dutch investigative team," the statement says.
According to the statement, Russia provided the international investigative team with all the continuous primary (unprocessed) data from the Utyos-T air route radar station that was in operation on July 17, 2014 and was located near the community of Ust-Donetsky in the Rostov Region. This radar reportedly did not spot any air objects approaching the Boeing airliner from the eastern side.
