“The European Court of Human Rights refused to consider the complaints of the relatives of the three victims of flight MH17, who accused Ukraine of not closing the skies over the war zone in July 2014.”, — write: www.pravda.com.ua
CRASHED PLANE MH17, PHOTO GETTY IMAGES Source: “European Truth” with reference to the published decision
Details: Based on the results of the review, the ECtHR rejected a group of complaints against Ukraine filed by the relatives of the three victims on board MH17.
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Referring to Art. 2 of the ECHR, the applicants insisted that the Ukrainian authorities did not take the necessary measures to protect the lives of their relatives, as they only partially closed the airspace over the combat zone, although they should have known about the presence of the Russian puppet forces of types of weapons capable of hitting a civil aviation aircraft at an altitude of more than 10 km.
The applicants argued that Ukraine should have known about this, based on the fact of the ongoing armed conflict and knowing about the arsenal of weapons that Russia has.
The court did not agree with the arguments of the applicants about the impossibility of effectively considering the issue in Ukrainian courts, which is why they immediately appealed to the ECtHR. In particular, the court noted that Ukrainian legislation provides for the possibility of appeals to Ukrainian courts, including foreign citizens, and also indicated that after the Sknyliv tragedy, Ukraine ensured an effective investigation of the events and the persons found responsible received sentences.
The court also noted that, in parallel with the investigation into the downing of MH17 as an act of terrorism, on the same day, July 17, Ukraine initiated an investigation into aviation safety, which was then delegated to the Dutch Safety Board.
The judges noted that they “cannot speculate” whether the Ukrainian civil aviation authorities knew or should have known about the presence of the Buk air defense system in the armed forces of the DPR as of July 17, 2014; and it would also be wrong to speculate whether Ukraine should have known that the SAM calculation had no radar to figure out what the target was in front of them.
It was also recalled that the investigation in The Hague regarding MH17 established that the Buk air defense system arrived in the militant-controlled territory of Ukraine from Russia only late in the evening of July 16.
As a result, the ECtHR concluded that the issue should first be considered in Ukraine under Ukrainian legislation before applying to the ECtHR. The complaint was declared inadmissible on the grounds that the possibilities within the national level judicial system had not yet been exhausted.
We will remind:
- The District Court of The Hague on November 17, 2022 in absentia sentenced to life imprisonment Ihor Girkin, Serhiy Dubinsky and Leonid Kharchenko for their role in the downing of the Malaysian airliner MH17 over Donbas and instructed to ensure their arrest. The court ruled that they should pay the relatives of the dead more than 16 million euros in compensation.
- The Hague Court also recognized that Russia controlled “DNR” during the downing of airliner MH17.
- In 2025 ICAO recognized Russia’s responsibility for the downing of flight MH17.