MH17: Investigators end downing probe despite “strong indications” Putin was involved
- Despite ‘a lot of new information’, prosecutors decided ‘the evidence is at the moment not concrete enough to lead to new prosecutions’
- A Russian Buk missile system was used to bring down the Boeing 777 Flight MH17 on July 17, 2014, killing all 298 passengers and crew
International prosecutors said on Wednesday they had found “strong indications” that Russian President Vladimir Putin approved the use in Ukraine of a Russian missile system that shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17) over eastern Ukraine in 2014.
However, they said evidence of Putin’s and other Russian officials’ involvement was not concrete enough to lead to a criminal conviction, and that they would end their probe without further prosecutions.
Russia has denied any involvement with the downing of the civilian airliner, which killed 298 passengers and crew.
“The investigation has now reached its limit,” prosecutor Digna van Boetzelaer told a news conference in The Hague. “The findings are insufficient for the prosecution of new suspects.”
In November, a Dutch court convicted two former Russian intelligence agents and a Ukrainian separatist leader of murder for helping arrange the Russian BUK missile system that was used to shoot the plane down. The three men, who were tried in absentia, remain at large.
At the time the plane was shot down, Ukrainian forces were fighting Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk province.
