A Dutch court on Thursday sentenced three men to life and acquitted another for the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over Ukraine in 2014, amid rising tensions over the ongoing Russian invasion.
Russians Igor Girkin and Sergei Dubinsky and Ukrainian Leonid Kharchenko were found guilty of murder and of having played a role in the downing of a plane; Russian Oleg Poulatov was acquitted, presiding judge Hendrik Steenhuis said.
The first three were convicted in absentia, as all four men refused to attend the trial, which lasted two and a half years.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, for his part, welcomed this “important decision”. “Punishment for all Russian atrocities — both yesterday and today — will be inevitable,” he added.
Many relatives of the victims from all over the world traveled to witness the announcement of this highly anticipated verdict in a highly secure court near Amsterdam-Schiphol airport, from where the Boeing 777 had taken off on July 17 2014. The trial is still subject to appeal.
All 298 passengers and crew were killed when the plane from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur was hit over pro-Russian separatist-held eastern Ukraine by what prosecutors say was a missile delivered by Moscow.
“Ask relatives who have lost their children: it is impossible to turn this page,” said Piet Ploeg, who lost his brother, his sister-in-law and his nephew, before the verdict.
“But I really hope that today, this verdict will allow them to take some distance from what happened to flight MH17, to try to move on with their lives,” continued Mr. Ploeg, president of a foundation for relatives of MH17 victims.
Judges ruled that Igor Girkinen, Sergei Dubinsky and Leonid Kharchenko could all be held responsible for transporting the BUK missile from a military base in Russia and deploying it to the launch site, even though they did not support themselves on the trigger.
There was insufficient evidence to show that Oleg Pulatov, the only suspect to have legal representation during the trial, was involved, they said.
“Abundance of evidence”
“The court is of the opinion that the crash of flight MH17 was caused by the firing of a BUK missile from an agricultural field near Pervomaiskyi (in eastern Ukraine), killing all the passengers”, a said presiding judge Hendrik Steenhuis.
“There is an abundance of evidence to support this conclusion,” such as a “butterfly-shaped fragment of the missile found in the body of a crew member” in the cockpit, he explained .
The court thus rejected an alternative scenario put forward by the defense which evoked the possibility of the involvement of a Ukrainian fighter plane.
In addition, the magistrates concluded that the People’s Republic of Donetsk, in the Donbass region, was “under the control of the Russian Federation” at the time of the destruction of MH17.
This means that the defendants do not have the right to claim immunity as combatants in an international conflict, because Russia “to this day denies” having controlled the region at the time.
The trial represents the end of a long quest for justice for the relatives of the victims, who came from 10 countries, including 196 Dutch, 43 Malaysians and 38 Australians.
“The international community should hunt them down,” Evert van Zijtveld, who lost his daughter Frederique, 19, his son Robert-Jan, 18, and his in-laws, told AFP.
The tragedy sparked global outrage and led to sanctions against Moscow.
Ukraine’s famous sunflower fields had been littered with bodies and debris, and some victims, including children, were still strapped to their seats.
Opened in March 2020 with a sad reading of the names of the victims, the so-called MH17 trial has meanwhile become a test case for efforts to bring perpetrators of war crimes in Ukraine to justice since 2014.
Three of the suspects were officially tried in absentia. The fourth, Oleg Poulatov, denied any guilt in a video statement.
Igor Girkin, 51, a former Russian spy who became the so-called defense minister of the breakaway Donetsk People’s Republic, was in contact with Moscow to obtain the missile system, according to the prosecution. He denied any involvement by separatists in the downing of MH17.
Sergei Dubinsky, 60, also linked to Russian intelligence, was allegedly the separatists’ military intelligence chief, and gave orders regarding the missile.
Their subordinates, Oleg Poulatov, a former Russian special forces soldier, and Leonid Kharchenko, 50, who allegedly led a separatist unit, played a more direct role in getting the missile to the launch site, according to the prosecution.
Moscow has denied any involvement in the tragedy and refused to extradite any suspects, saying it was illegal under Russian law.