MOSCOW, August 26 /ITAR-TASS/. International community should not allow to manipulate the investigation of Malaysia Airlines MH17 flight crash into oblivion, the same way it happened with investigations into many other Ukrainian tragedies, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says in an interview published by Russia Beyond the Headlines, a supplement to The Daily Telegraph.
“We must not allow the investigation of the MH17 crash to be manipulated into oblivion, which has happened to investigations into many Ukrainian tragedies, including the sniper assault on civilians in Kiev in February, massacres in Odessa and Mariupol in May and others,” he said, adding that Moscow was determined to bring to justice all those bearing responsibility for these crimes.
With regard to MH17, Lavrov recalled Russia had put forward a number of questions on its par that remained unanswered.
“For examples, where are the transcripts of the exchanges between the pilots of MH17 and the Ukrainian air controllers and why were they not presented to the international community?” he asked. “Why did the controllers instruct the flight to enter the conflict zone? What was a Ukrainian air force plane doing in the near-vicinity of the Malaysian Boeing right before the incident? What was happening to the wreckage at the crash site and why it has not been examined by the appropriate international investigating authorities?”
Lavrov also recalled that there was no unimpeded access for experts to the crash site, as the pro-Kiev forces continued their combat activity there in violation of the UN Security Council’s Resolution 2166.
“And where is the documented evidence of the claims by the U.S. officials regarding the causes of the downing of the aircraft?” he added.
“We hope to get answers to these and other questions from the states that took the leading role in the international investigation and from those who made unsubstantiated public statements,” Lavrov said. “Truth must be revealed.”