MOSCOW, July 17. /TASS/. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov reminded reporters on Wednesday that Russia believes that the investigation into the MH17 flight crash over Ukraine, which is being conducted in the Netherlands, is not objective.
"We do not consider this investigation to be objective. From the very start, Russia was offering to take part in the joint work to determine who was behind this terrible tragedy, but Moscow was denied such an opportunity. Therefore, we cannot recognize the results of such an investigation as objective," he said.
Peskov also could not comment on the open letter addressed to the Russian leadership by relatives of those killed in the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 crash, which was published in the media. The letter, among other, contains a call to the Russian authorities to recognize its part of responsibility for the destruction of MH17.
"Unfortunately, I am not aware of this letter and I cannot tell you anything about it," Peskov said, answering a question whether the Kremlin had studied it.
Earlier, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a comment, pointing out that the Dutch authorities are abusing the feelings and sorrow of the relatives of those who died in the crash.
Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, a Boeing-777 passenger plane travelling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was shot down on July 17, 2014 over Ukraine’s eastern region of Donetsk. The crash killed all the 283 passengers, citizens of 10 countries, and 15 crew. In spite of the ongoing armed conflict on the ground, Kiev did not close its airspace over the Donbass region to international passenger flights. The Joint Investigation Team (JIT) looking into the crash is made up of representatives from the Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, Malaysia and Ukraine. Russian officials have repeatedly expressed doubts and distrust of the results of its work, pointing to the groundless nature of arguments behind the accusations and unwillingness to apply Russian conclusions in the course of the investigation.