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Preliminary report on Malaysia MH17 crash due shortly

Dutch Safety Board spokesperson Sara Vernooij says the preliminary report will shed certain light on the cause of the tragedy, but many questions still remain unanswered

THE HAGUE, September 02. /ITAR-TASS/. A preliminary report on the cause of the crash of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over the embattled eastern Ukraine is almost ready, Dutch Safety Board spokesperson Sara Vernooij told ITAR-TASS on Tuesday.

The report will be ready either at the end of the week or early next week, she said. Vernooij said the preliminary report will shed certain light on the cause of the tragedy, but many questions still remain unanswered. In order to answer them, a more thorough investigation was needed and its results would be published next spring according to the board’s preliminary estimates, she said.

Vernooji said all investigators were currently working in The Hague. The Dutch Safety Board was planning to send experts to the crash site when it would be safe enough in the area, she added.

This was not absolutely necessary as the final report could be prepared without a visit to the site, she said, adding, however, that it would be preferable to examine certain debris and get confirmation to available data on the ground.

A Malaysia Airlines jet carrying 298 people crashed in east Ukraine on July 17 on a flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. Both sides in Ukraine’s conflict accused each other of shooting down the plane with a missile. There were no survivors. Most of the victims, 196, were Dutch nationals.

Kiev’s military operation designed to regain control over the eastern Ukrainian breakaway Donetsk and Luhansk regions, which on May 11 proclaimed their independence at local referendums, was launched in mid-April and has involved armored vehicles, heavy artillery and attack aviation.