Flight MH17: life sentences for three men accused of shooting down a Malaysia Airlines plane in 2014

A Dutch court on Thursday sentenced three men to life imprisonment and acquitted a fourth for the July 2014 shooting down of the MH17 airliner. malaysian airlines in eastern Ukrainian airspace, then controlled by pro-Russian separatist forces.

The 298 passengers and crew members of MH17 died after a missile hit this commercial plane that covered the route Amsterdam-Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia).

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The Russians Igor Guirkin Y Sergei Dubinsky and the ukrainian Leonid Kharchenko were “convicted” of intentional murder by shooting down the plane, while the Russian Oleg Pulatov was acquitted, according to the sentence handed down by the judge Hendrik Steenhuis.

The court sentenced the three men, tried in their absence, to life imprisonment, though it is unclear whether they will ever serve their sentences.

The four defendants are free and none of them attended the announcement of the sentence, as well as the rest of the hearings of the trial, which lasted two and a half years.

The impact occurred when the plane was flying over the airspace of Donbas, then controlled by pro-Russian separatists and which currently represents the area where the most intense fighting is taking place in the war in Ukraine.

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“There is plenty of evidence”

Piet Plogpresident of the MH17 foundation, who lost his brother, sister-in-law and a nephew in the tragic incident, told AFP that he hoped the sentence would help the relatives of the victims to heal the wound of the loss.

“I don’t think this one will close completely. (…) But I really hope that this day helps the relatives (of the victims) to move forward in their lives.”, He affirmed, in statements outside the courtroom, about a sentence that put an end to the long journey of the relatives to get justice done.

Girkin, Dubinski, Kharchenko and Pulatov were part of the separatist forces in eastern Ukraine, supported by Moscow.

The judges considered that the three convicted men were responsible for having deployed BUK missiles from a military base in Russia and for having installed them in the place from where they were launched, although they were not the ones who pressed the button.

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“There are numerous pieces of evidence that allow us to reach this conclusion.”What “a butterfly-shaped fragment found on the body of a crew member”, explained.

The court rejected the alternative hypothesis defended by the defense lawyer that a Ukrainian fighter was involved in the downing of the plane.

The judges also assured that the Donetsk People’s Republic was then “under control of the Russian Federation”.

Moscow always denied any involvement in this tragedy.

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“An important decision”

“The decision of the court in The Hague is an important one”stressed the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, after the announcement of the sentence.

“The punishment of all Russian atrocities, both past and present, will be inevitable”he added.

During the events, Guirkin, 51, was a former Russian spy who was appointed as the Defense Minister of the Donetsk People’s Republic and was in contact with Moscow to obtain the help of the missile system.

Dubinski, 60, also linked to the Russian intelligence services, was in charge of the separatists’ military intelligence services and allegedly gave the order to activate the missiles.

Pulatov and Kharchenko were his subordinates and, according to the prosecution, were in charge of taking the missiles to the launch site.

The victims came from ten different countries (none of them Spanish-speaking) and among them were 196 Dutch, 43 Malaysian and 38 Australian.

“If they are guilty, the international community should persecute them.”he told AFP Evert van Zijtveld, who lost her 19-year-old daughter Frederique, her 18-year-old son Robert-Jan, and her in-laws.

“I can’t forgive them” he added in statements before the announcement of the sentence.

Source: Elcomercio

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I am Jack Morton and I work in 24 News Recorder. I mostly cover world news and I have also authored 24 news recorder. I find this work highly interesting and it allows me to keep up with current events happening around the world.