BREAKING: Three men found guilty of shooting down Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, killing 298 people

A court in Amsterdam found three men guilty of downing Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 and killing 298 people with a missile in July 2014.

A verdict by the Hague District Court at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam today, Thursday, November 17, declared three Russians to be guilty of shooting down Malaysia Airlines flight MH17. They were sentenced to life in prison in absentia. 

The court heard that flight MH17 was brought down by a Russian-made Buk missile fired from a field in eastern Ukraine. At the time of the incident on July 17, 2014, the aircraft was en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur in Singapore. The subsequent crash resulted in the death of 298 people.

Two Russian men, Sergey Dubinskiy and Igor Girkin, along with Ukrainian citizen, Leonid Kharchenko, were found guilty of 298 counts of murder and ‘unlawfully causing an aeroplane to crash’. Oleg Pulatov, a fourth defendant, was found not guilty. The court deemed that he did not have prior knowledge of the plan to fire the missile and he was subsequently acquitted.

As a result of the plane being shot down, images taken over a radius of 50m² from the crash site showed dead bodies scattered along with passports. Engine parts and pieces of the plane’s broken fuselage were also recovered from over a wide area.

A report by investigators from the Dutch Safety Board concluded that the Boeing 777 probably went down over the Ukrainian pro-Russian region of the Donetsk People’s Republic after crossing the Russia-Ukraine border. It broke apart in mid-air after being targeted by a missile fired from the 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile brigade. The 15 crew members and 283 passengers all died, as reported by the MFA of Ukraine.

Today, the District court of the Hague has found guilty & sentenced to the lifetime imprisonment of 3 persons responsible for shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 on July 17, 2014. All 298 people on board, incl 80 children, have lost their lives.https://t.co/JCBbr3miFh pic.twitter.com/D6zegf6pTO

— MFA of Ukraine 🇺🇦 (@MFA_Ukraine) November 17, 2022

The guilty verdict issued today against three members of Russian proxy forces in the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 is an important step toward justice for the 298 individuals who lost their lives on July 17, 2014.

— Secretary Antony Blinken (@SecBlinken) November 17, 2022

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