Russian missile downed Malaysia Airlines flight MH17: investigation team
Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was shot down in Ukrainian airspace by a Russian ground-to-air Buk missile as it flew from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur on July 7, 2014, according to the findings of an international investigation team released on Wednesday. All 298 passengers and crew on the Boeing 777 were killed. The team found that the missile launcher had been brought to Ukraine from Russian territory, and had been fired in a field next to the town of Pervomaiskyi, located in an area that was at that time under the control of pro-Russian rebels. The Holland-based team also determined that the launcher was sent back to Russia immediately after the incident. The report did not accuse Moscow of shooting down the plane, and did not determine who gave the order to move the launcher to the Ukraine or who gave the order to fire. The missile was from the Buk 9M83 series that is fired from a mobile launcher. A Dutch team investigated the crash in 2015 and reached very similar conclusions but was not able to determine the exact location where the missile was fired.