DISINFO: Security Service of Ukraine imposed the theory that MH17 was shot down by a Russian BUK
SUMMARY
The Security Service of Ukraine imposed a theory on the international investigation team that the MH17 plane was allegedly shot down by the Russian BUK air defence system, driven from one of the military units of the Russian Armed Forces.
RESPONSE
One of the numerous unfounded conspiracy theories attempting to discredit the work of the Joint International Investigation on the downing of the flight MH17.
The Joint Investigation Team (JIT), is comprised of Dutch Public Prosecution Service officials and the Dutch police, along with police and criminal justice authorities from Australia, Belgium, Malaysia and Ukraine. It is not possible for Ukraine to impose 'a theory' on a professional multinational criminal investigation team.
The JIT concluded that flight MH17 was shot down on 17 July 2014 by a missile of the 9M38 series, launched by a BUK-TELAR, from farmland in the vicinity of Pervomaiskiy. At that time, the area was controlled by pro-Russian fighters. The BUK-TELAR was brought in from the territory of the Russian Federation and subsequently, after having shot down flight MH17, was taken back to the Russian Federation. The Dutch-led Joint Investigation Team (JIT) has concluded that the BUK-TELAR used to down MH17 originated from the 53rd Anti Aircraft Missile brigade, a unit of the Russian army from Kursk in the Russian Federation.
On the basis of the investigation conducted by the JIT, the Dutch Public Prosecution Service is prosecuting Igor Vsevolodovich Girkin, Sergey Nikolayevich Dubinskiy, Oleg Yuldashevich Pulatov, and Leonid Volodymyrovych Kharchenko for causing the crash of MH17 and murdering the 298 persons on board. The trial began on 9 March 2020 in the Netherlands.
You can see other examples of pro-Kremlin disinformation on the MH17 case in our database, such as claims that crash of MH17 was triggered by an explosion on board; that the plane was not downed by a BUK missile, but rather by a Ukrainian fighter; that the trial in The Hague is not justice but information warfare; or that it is a US provocation against Russia.