MH17 crash investigators say four suspects face murder charges

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https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/19/europ...ntl/index.html

(CNN) — Four people will be charged with murder and causing the crash of
Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, five years after the plane was shot down in eastern
Ukraine killing 298 people, international investigators said Wednesday.

The Joint Investigation Team (JIT) said it would issue national and
international arrest warrants Wednesday for the four suspects. Three Russians,
Igor Girkin, Sergey Dubinskiy and Oleg Pulatov, were named, along with Ukrainian
Leonid Kharchenko.

According to investigators, Girkin is a former colonel of Russia's Federal
Security Service (FSB), Dubinskiy was employed by Russia's military intelligence
agency GRU and Pulatov was a former soldier of the Russian special forces,
Spetsnaz-GRU.

Ukraine's Kharchenko had no military background, but is believed to have led a
combat unit in Donetsk in July 2014.

Investigators said they would not ask for the suspects to be extradited because
the Russian and Ukrainian constitutions prohibit extraditing nationals.

They added that they would ask Russia to cooperate with the investigation, and
both countries to question the suspects about the charges.

All four suspects are charged with "causing the crash of MH17, leading to the
death of all the people on board ... and murdering 298 passengers of flight
MH17," Dutch prosecutor Fred Westerbeke announced.

Girkin, who acted as defense minister for the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's
Republic, said separatists in eastern Ukraine were not responsible for downing
the Boeing aircraft, adding that investigators had not contacted him about the
case.

"The [separatist] rebels did not down the Boeing, and I cannot comment further
or clarify," he told Russia's Business FM radio.

Asked if the JIT had contacted him, Girkin said, "No, they have not contacted
me."

Flight MH17 was shot out of the sky over territory held by pro-Russian
separatists as it flew from Amsterdam to the Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur in
July 2014. The 298 who died came from 17 countries.

According to Westerbeke, the suspects are not accused of firing the missile, but
are "just as punishable as the person who committed the crime," Westerbeke said.

He added that they are suspected of obtaining the Buk missile "with the goal to
shoot a plane."

Their trial will take place on March 9, 2020 at the Schiphol Judicial Complex in
Badhoevedorp, investigators said, adding that the accused will be tried in
absentia if necessary.




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