Russia accuses Prosecutor of Netherlands of bias in investigation of MH17 crash
Russia considers the Dutch prosecutor’s office unfair and biased in its accusations that Russia has not provided sufficient help in the investigation of the Malaysian Boeing disaster, which occurred in July 2014, said the representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia Maria Zakharova.
“Once again, we have confirmed what we observed initially in the matter of the investigation of the MN17 disaster, only now it is officially announced, in connection with the Attorney General of the Netherlands. I'm talking about the obviously biased attitude towards Russia and the extremely selective approach of Holland in the formation of a body of evidence, which cannot be called objective,” the statement said.
“Interaction with Russia as a whole is assessed quite ambiguously. From the mouth of Mr. Westerbeke we hear the term ‘not easy,’ and a doubt is voiced about Russia's desire to ‘truly cooperate.’ From our point of view, such statements are extremely unfair, given the impressive amount of data Russia has provided to the investigation from the very first day,” the diplomat said.
The joint investigation team (JIT) received a new photo of a BUK-TELAR missile and called for witnesses to come forward, promising protection and security.
The Malaysian Airlines Boeing777, en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was shot down on July 17, 2014 near the village of Hrabove in the Donetsk region. As a result, 298 people were killed; 196 of them were citizens of the Netherlands. The prosecutor’s office of the Netherlands is investigating the disaster. On September 28, a joint investigation team (JIT) released an interim report on the first stage of the investigation of the crash of the Malaysian Airlines plane. The international report says that the plane was shot down by a Buk missile brought in from Russia, and those who fired it were in the uncontrolled territory of Ukraine.