Dutch Safety Board Examining New Russian Findings on MH17 Crash

The Dutch Safety Board (DSB) has confirmed the receipt of a letter from Russia's civil aviation regulator Rosaviatsia and is now examining the new facts on the investigation of the MH17 crash over Ukraine in July 2014, DSB spokesperson told Sputnik on Thursday.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Earlier in the day, Rosaviatsia said its deputy head Oleg Storchevoy sent a letter to the Dutch Safety Board with new facts obtained by Russian experts through an additional study which confirms that some conclusions of the final report on the MH17 crash over Ukraine were unsubstantiated and inaccurate.

“We just received it and we are studying into it,” Wim van der Weegen said stressing that it was not clear when the DSB would comment on the new facts provided by Russian experts.

The new facts of the Dutch report called into question include the presence of heavy air defense systems in eastern Ukraine that were not controlled by Ukrainian government forces, the fact that the aircraft was hit by a 9N314M high-explosive fragmentation warhead, that the warhead that hit the aircraft was carried by a 9M38-series missile launched by a Buk surface-to-air missile system, and the position of the missile in relation to the aircraft at the moment of detonation, as well as the area it was launched from.

Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 crashed over the Donetsk region in southeastern Ukraine on July 17, 2014, killing all 298 people on board. The Kiev government forces and local independence supporters were fighting in the area at the time, and traded blame for the incident.

On October 13, 2015, the Dutch Safety Board published a report stating that the MH17 aircraft that had been shot down using a Russia-produced Buk surface-to-air missile system. However, the organization was unable to identify the exact location from where the missile was launched, saying it could have been fired from anywhere within "an area of 320 square kilometers (123 square miles) in eastern Ukraine."

Russian arms manufacturer Almaz-Antey, which has conducted a separate probe into the crash, said the missile had exploded near the left side of the aircraft and considered this fact to be proof that the missile could only have been a 9M38 missile from a Buk system launched from the region of Zaroshchenske, controlled by Kiev forces at the time of the incident.