Press release on the decision by the ICAO Council in the case filed by Australia and the Netherlands against the Russian Federation regarding the downing of the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200 aircraft operating flight MH17

The International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) issued a press release saying that on May 12, the organisation’s Council held a vote on the crash of the MH17 Malaysian Boeing aircraft in 2014. Australia and the Netherlands initiated this procedure back in March 2022.

Russia is not part of the ICAO Council. In its press release, this body alleges that the responsibility for downing this flight rests with the Russian Federation. However, the text of the ruling, including its reasoning part, is not available. Therefore, this amounted to a blind vote – it is quite obvious that this decision does not hold water. Once again, the ICAO Council demonstrated its political bias. It takes its decision while guided by momentary considerations. This is not the way it must operate.

Russia withdrew from these proceedings last year, on June 17, 2024, in view of the multiple procedural violations by the Council and the ICAO Secretariat, which made an impartial fact-finding effort all but impossible. That said, Moscow’s principled position remains relevant to this day – Russia was not involved in the MH17 crash, while all the claims to the contrary coming from Australia and the Netherlands are at odds with reality.

But before its withdrawal, Russia submitted exhaustive and convincing evidence and facts to the Council demonstrating that it was not involved in the crash. All member states in the Council received this information.

On several occasions, Russia suggested that the Council undertakes a full, thorough and independent international investigation into the MH17 crash, as requested in UN Security Council Resolution 2166 (2014). However, guided by a political agenda and in violation of the corresponding procedure, the Council refused to carry out this investigation. Instead, it opted for giving credence to the claims by Australia and the Netherlands, as well as the outcomes produced by the Joint Investigative Team, formed by these two countries, Australia and the Netherlands, as well as Ukraine, i.e., countries with a direct interest in denigrating Russia.

All the conclusions in the Dutch investigation are based on evidence coming from anonymous witnesses whose identity has been concealed, as well as dubious pieces of evidence and materials from Ukraine’s Security Service, which has a vested interest in this case.

Claims by the Netherlands and Australia about using satellite imagery as evidence are also a lie, since they never had any images of this kind at their disposal. There is nothing but groundless claims that the United States possesses satellite images demonstrating that a surface-to-air missile downed Flight MH17. However, the United States has been firm in its refusal to share these images.

The Council has completely ignored the fact that Ukraine had its Buk surface-to-air missile systems stationed near the crash site, as well as the markings on the missile fragments demonstrating that it came from Ukraine. This was not the first time when Ukraine downed a civilian aircraft – in 2001, its air defence forces downed a Russian Tu-154M aircraft over the Black Sea.

In addition to this, guided in its work by the countries of the so-called collective West and their satellites, the Council has also ignored the January 31, 2024, ruling by the UN’s International Court of Justice in the Ukraine v. Russia case. It rejected Kiev’s claims to hold Russia responsible for the MH17 crash.

The ICAO Council is not an independent body. It includes 36 ICAO member states out of 193. They get their voting instructions from their respective capitals. Most of the countries represent the West and their immediate satellites. This makes the way the Council operates a matter of arithmetic. There was simply nobody to tackle this matter in a professional manner and on its merits.

There is nothing new about using the ICAO Council against countries which are viewed as being undesirable by the West. This can hardly come as a surprise to anyone these days. Suffice to recall the investigation of the landing of a Ryanair flight at the Minsk airport on May 23, 2021. At the time, the interested Western countries were not satisfied with the preliminary report by the Investigative Team. They used their majority within the Council to force the team to re-write the report to ensure that it condemns Belarus. Moreover, the ICAO Council ruled that it was competent to review the Great Britain, Sweden, Ukraine, Canada v. Iran case regarding the crash of a Boeing aircraft near Tehran after a vote held behind the curtains. There was also a recent example when the Council refused to take up Venezuela’s claims in its dispute with Argentina regarding unilateral restrictions in civil aviation.

Of course, Russia reaffirms its sympathy and compassion towards the families of MH17 crash victims. However, we must make it clear that the Kiev regime is the main culprit in this tragedy. It was Kiev which started an armed conflict in 2014 by launching a military operation against Donbass under the false pretext of combatting terrorism. The UN’s International Court of Justice later confirmed that this pretext was deprived of any substance by saying that DPR and LPR were not terrorist organisations. It was Kiev that shelled and bombed Donetsk, Lugansk and other cities in Donbass, killed civilians, including women and children.

Kiev refused to close the air space over the combat zone and used civilian aircraft like Flight MH17 as a cover-up for its bombers.

Russia refuses to accept the Council’s decision. It is illegitimate, runs counter to the 1944 Convention on International Civil Aviation and its own rules of procedure. Unlike the biased Council majority, Russia reaffirms its commitment to UN Security Council Resolution 2166 (2014) for the sake of establishing the true causes of the crash.