MOSCOW, June 9. /TASS/. Washington conceals facts of colossal importance regarding the MH17 plane disaster over Ukraine by refusing to provide satellite images taken in July 2014, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the international forum of experts, diplomats and decision-makers Primakov Readings on Wednesday.
"They continue to stubbornly and categorically refuse to provide satellite images taken in July 2014, when the Malaysia Airlines Boeing airliner disaster happened. A court in the Netherlands said a few days ago that there was no longer any hope the Americans would provide these images. The subject for the court is closed," he said.
"In fact, evidence of colossal importance is kept secret," Lavrov stressed.
A Boeing-777 passenger liner of Malaysia Airlines, (flight MH17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur) was shot down over Ukraine's Donetsk Region on July 17, 2014. All 298 passengers and crew - citizens of ten countries - perished in the catastrophe. A Joint Investigation Team was created to probe the disaster. In June 2019, the JIT said it had identified a group of four suspects: former chief of the Donetsk People's Republic's militia Igor Girkin (Strelkov) and his subordinates Sergey Dubinsky, Oleg Pulatov and Leonid Kharchenko. A court case against them began in the Netherlands on March 9, 2020. They are accused of allegedly delivering a Buk air defense missile launcher from Russia to Ukraine.
Russian officials have repeatedly expressed distrust towards the results from the JIT and pointed to the lack of arguments that might back up the charges and to the reluctance to take into consideration Moscow's arguments in conducting the investigation.