The international team of experts investigating the MH17 tragedy in eastern Ukraine have called for possible witnesses to turn in any evidence that might back a scenario that the airliner was shot down by a Buk missile system.
In a video address, released by the Joint Investigation Team
(JIT), possible witnesses have been encouraged to share their
photo and video materials to prove that a Buk surface-to-air
missile launcher was transported through the Donbass region
before and after the MH17 incident last July.
“The focus of one scenario
is that the MH17 was shot down by a Buk missile
system,”JIT said in
a statement. “We are
looking for witnesses who have seen Buk crew members or have more
information about the identity of those involved in ordering and
launching the Buk.”
Although some media
rushed to conclusions, spokesman for the Dutch Public Prosecutor,
Wim de Bruin, emphasized that there is “more than one”
scenario. “But the
one of the Buk rocket has a lot of unanswered questions and
that’s why we have put out an appeal,” de Bruin said, calling it
a“leading
scenario.”
“This appeal for
witnesses does not mean that police and prosecutors have
definitively concluded what caused MH17 to crash,” the
address said. “For that, more investigation is
needed.”
A preliminary report of
the official investigation published in September 2014 only said
that the crash was a result of structural damage caused by a
large number of high-energy objects that struck the Boeing from
the outside. The report did not specify what the objects were,
where they came from or who was responsible.
No other verifiable evidence has yet been made publicly
available, besides objective air control and military monitoring
data partially released by the Russian Defense Ministry, which
indicated the presence of Ukrainian surface-to-air batteries and
warplanes in the area on the day of the Boeing shooting.
READ
MORE: ‘Reuters lied’: MH17 witness says reporter falsified
testimony
Amid the JIT call for witnesses, a local resident in Lugansk
region – whom Reuters cited as saying he saw evidence of a
surface-to-air missile launched from rebel-held territory – has
told RT that the news agency gave a false report of his
interview.
Russia’s Foreign
Minister Sergey Lavrov slammed Reuters’ report as“stovepiping”from a seemingly“respected agency”.
“Attempts at distorting facts, enforcing theories as to what
could have happened continue to exist, with some based on openly
dirty intentions,” Lavrov told journalists.
Yet the JIT investigators, pursuing their “leading” scenario in
the crash investigation, have compiled a video that incorporated
both social-media-sourced materials and unverified audio files
apparently provided by the Ukrainian Intelligence Service,
stipulating direct Russian involvement in the tragedy. The team
alleges that the Buk missile launcher was seen several times
around the time of the crash, yet no real evidence has been
offered to support this theory.
READ MORE: MH17 investigation going off in ‘wrong
direction’ could embarrass ‘many powerful people’
The US intelligence community apparently does not have any
evidence to support Russian involvement in any way, investigative
journalist Robert Parry told RT, citing his intelligence sources
and own probe.
Soon after the tragedy, Parry was told “their actual evidence
was going in a very different direction.” Eight months after
the tragedy the US stands by its old assessment of the incident
all based on “circumstantial evidence” and social media
reports, refusing to release new data, Perry says.