Today it is 5 years since 298 innocent people lost their lives when Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was shot down over Eastern Ukraine. This blog is a memorial to the dead and a shame to those who shot down the plane.

The war in eastern Ukraine in the area often called Donbas had lasted for a couple of months at that time. There were fierce battles between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed separatists or perhaps more precisely Russian forces.

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The shooting

It was an ordinary Thursday. MH17 was supposed to fly its route from Amsterdam in the Netherlands to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. The flight’s route is over Ukraine. At an altitude of 10,000 metres, the plane is shot down. A pro-Russian rebel leader, Igor Stelkov, reported on social media at 1:50 p.m. that they had shot down a Ukrainian transport plane near Torez. In the afternoon, the Russian news channel lifenews.ru also reported that a Ukrainian transport plane had been shot down.

Then later that afternoon, Igor Stelkov’s post was removed from social media. Telephone conversations between pro-Russian rebels show that they became aware that it was a passenger plane when they arrived at the wreckage.

Ukrainian authorities were quick to accuse Russia of the downing. They claimed that Russia had supplied the rebels with BUK M1 anti-aircraft missiles. Russia denied this. They have never admitted any participation in the war in eastern Ukraine. After a few days, Russia published satellite images that were supposed to show that Ukraine was behind it. These images were quickly exposed as fakes.

The MH17 investigation

The Dutch Air Accidents Commission was in charge of the investigation after the accident. It was concluded that the plane was shot down with a BUK missile system as Ukraine claimed. The rocket was launched from the part controlled by Russia and pro-Russian rebels. Recently became 4 men wanted internationally for being behind the shooting itself.

We must never forget this war crime committed against totally innocent people. Civil aviation is equipped with signals so that civilian aircraft are not to be confused with military ones. This is what enables us to follow a flight via the internet. The BUK missile system must be equipped so that it would be a simple matter for them to check whether it was a civilian aircraft before they fired.

I shine peace over memory to all 298