Rebels foiling crash inquiry, Ukraine says

It alleges 3 missile systems quietly sent back to Russia

Sunday, July 20, 2014

HRABOVE, Ukraine -- Armed separatists hampered access to the Malaysia Airlines crash site Saturday, limiting the movements of international monitors and raising concerns that evidence showing who shot down the plane, killing the 298 people onboard, would be lost or tampered with.

Also Saturday, Vitaly Nayda, Ukraine's counterintelligence chief, said three Buk missile systems were moved Friday from eastern Ukraine across the border into Russia, including one that was missing a surface-to-air missile that officials believe took down the jet the day before.

The Ukrainian government and separatist rebels accuse each other of firing a missile at the Boeing 777. Many see the hand of Russia, either for its suspected support of the insurgents or perhaps for actually firing the missile.

The government in Kiev said militiamen had removed 38 bodies from the crash site near the Russian border and taken them to the rebel-held city of Donetsk. It said the remains were transported with help from specialists with distinct Russian accents.

Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for Ukraine's National Defense and Security Council, said officials believed that rebels were blocking access to remove missile fragments that would help prove that a Russian missile destroyed the plane.

In Donetsk, separatist leader Alexander Borodai denied that any bodies had been transferred or that the rebels had in any way interfered with the work of observers. He said he encouraged the involvement of the international community in assisting with the cleanup before the bodies deteriorate further.

Ukraine called on Moscow to insist that the pro-Russia rebels grant international experts the ability to conduct a thorough, impartial investigation into the downing of the plane, echoing a demand that President Barack Obama issued a day earlier from Washington.

The jet, flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, carried 298 passengers and crew members from 13 countries.

Treatment of the victims' remains, left in the open air under a hot summer sun, provoked anger and distress.

"The news we got today of the bodies being dragged around, of the site not being treated properly, has really created a shock in the Netherlands," Dutch Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans told the Ukrainian president in Kiev. "People are angry, are furious at what they hear."

Timmermans demanded the culprits be found.

"Once we have the proof, we will not stop until the people are brought to justice," he said.

Officials from Malaysia and the Netherlands, which had the most citizens aboard the plane, urged that the crash site be secured and that recovery operations be allowed to proceed.

"We urge all those involved to respect the families, and the nations who have lost their sons and daughters in this attack," Liow Tiong Lai, the Malaysian transport minister, said at a news conference Saturday. "Yes, MH-17 has become a geopolitical issue, but we must not forget that it is a human tragedy."

An angry Dutch prime minister said Saturday that he was "shocked by images of completely disrespectful behavior" of rebels picking through the wreckage and personal belongings of victims at the crash scene. Mark Rutte said he had an "extremely intense" telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin in which he urged Putin to "show the world he intends to help" in the investigation.

Tensions flared on several fronts with reports of heavy fighting between rebels and government forces in the eastern city of Luhansk, a reminder that the crash site is in an active combat zone. Meanwhile, the Kremlin announced that it was imposing economic sanctions on 12 Americans in retaliation for a new round of economic sanctions announced last week against Russian companies.

Putin and German Chancellor Angela Merkel agreed Saturday in a phone call that an independent commission led by the International Civil Aviation Organization should be granted swift access to the crash site, according to the German government and the Kremlin.

The commission should examine the circumstances of the crash and recover the victims, German government spokesman Georg Streiter said.

Russia has "a key role to play" through its influence on the separatists, "and the world's eyes will be on Russia to see that she delivers on her obligations," British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said.

In the Netherlands, forensic teams fanned out across the country Saturday to collect material, including DNA samples, which will help identify the remains of the 192 Dutch victims.

Police said in a tweet that 40 pairs of detectives from the National Forensic Investigations Team would be visiting victims' relatives over the coming days.

In Kiev, officials also said there was still no clear information about the location of the flight data recorders. They were said to have been recovered at the scene but then taken by rebels.

The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe's monitoring mission in Ukraine, which has a 24-member delegation that was given limited access to the crash site, said it too had received no information on the boxes' whereabouts, a spokesman said.

Aviation experts say, however, not to expect too much from the flight data and cockpit voice recorders in understanding how Flight 17 was brought down.

The most useful evidence that's likely to come from the crash scene is whether missile pieces can be found in the trail of debris that came down as the plane exploded, said John Goglia, a U.S. aviation safety expert and former National Transportation Safety Board member.

The operation of Flight 17 does not appear to be an issue, he said.

Obama called the downing of the plane "a global tragedy."

"An Asian airliner was destroyed in European skies filled with citizens from many countries, so there has to be a credible international investigation into what happened," he said.

Buk missile system

Ukraine's announcement on the movement of three Buk missile systems came a day after Nayda posted a video purportedly showing a single Buk system, with at least one missile missing, making the trip to Russia on a road in eastern Ukraine.

"We documented negotiations between terrorists and got information from those conversations that three Russian personnel came with it," he said at a news conference in Kiev. "There were Russian citizens operating the Buk-M1, and they came from territory of the Russian Federation."

The new disclosure suggests that the Russian government supplied multiple anti-aircraft systems to the separatists, which Nayda said were also used to bring down two Ukrainian military transport planes earlier in the week. The systems crossed the border separately at 2 and 4 a.m. Kiev time on Friday, Nayda said.

Ukraine also accused Russia and separatist rebels in the east of trying to cover up their role by blocking recovery workers from the crash site and by removing evidence.

The Kremlin has forcefully denied any role in the downing of the plane and has gone on the offensive, saying that the Ukrainian military's anti-aircraft weapons may have been responsible.

Ukrainian officials called for an international investigation.

"We have proof that the terrorist attack was planned and carried out with the involvement of representatives of the Russian Federation," Nayda, the intelligence official, said. "We know that Russia is trying to hide its terrorist activity and their direct involvement."

Russian officials have stopped short of directly pointing a finger at Kiev, but they have issued their own calls for a thorough international inquiry.

In a statement Saturday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said it "appeals to both sides of the Ukrainian conflict, urging them to do everything possible to enable access for international experts to the airplane crash area in order to take action necessary for the investigation."

At an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Friday, the U.S. pointed blame at the separatists, saying Washington believes the jetliner was probably downed by an SA-11 missile.

According to U.S. officials, American intelligence analysts are still going over data to determine more precisely who fired the missile and where the attackers got the SA-11 surface-to-air system.

Analysts would likely be reviewing sensor and radar data, and possibly satellite imagery from around the time of the strike, as well as from previous days.

Although Russia and Ukraine have the systems in their weapons inventory, U.S. officials have said they do not believe the Ukrainian government had any of the SA-11s in that region.

Instead, analysts are looking more closely at whether Russian backers gave the missile launcher to the separatists and moved it across the border into Ukraine, or if this was something captured by rebels from the Ukrainian military.

Meanwhile in Malaysia, flags flew at half-staff after the nation's second air tragedy in four months, as Prime Minister Najib Razak urged citizens to pray for the country to be protected from disasters and threats. Forty-four Malaysians were among the 298 people killed.

"It's a double-tragedy year for Malaysia," said Lim Kee Seng, 57, a businessman from Malaysia. "I am speechless looking at all the things that are happening."

In March, Malaysian Air Flight 370 disappeared en route for Beijing from Kuala Lumpur, with 239 passengers and crew members on board, sparking the world's longest search for a missing jetliner in modern aviation history. That plane hasn't yet been found.

Coping with two disasters within a few months has left some Malaysia Airlines employees so shaken that they've been unable to function properly at work, said Ismail Nasaruddin, president of the National Union of Flight Attendants Malaysia.

"Some of them are sad and very depressed," he said at a news conference. "We have not overcome the battle of missing MH370, and within such a short period, this incident has taken place involving another Malaysia aircraft."

In the Netherlands, travelers flying out of Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport laid flowers and signed a condolence book Saturday before boarding their flights.

Flight 17 carried 283 passengers and 15 crew members, with Dutch travelers making up the biggest national group, according to a tally by Malaysian Airlines. Other nationalities included people from Australia, Indonesia, the United Kingdom, Germany, Belgium, the Philippines, Canada and New Zealand. One American was also aboard.

In Australia, the national flag was flown at half-staff today as a mark of respect for its citizens who died in the crash, while a commemorative service is planned for a later date.

Information for this article was contributed by Peter Leonard, Evgeniy Maloletka, David McHugh, Mstyslav Chernov, Michael Corder, Frank Jordans, Jim Heintz, Lolita C. Baldor and Satish Cheney of The Associated Press; by Steven Zeitchik of the Los Angeles Times; by David M. Herszenhorn, Sabrina Tavernise, Neil MacFarquhar, Keith Bradsher, Christopher Buckley and Michael R. Gordon of The New York Times; and by Niluksi Koswanage, Choong En Han, Manirajan Ramasamy, Elffie Chew, Nichola Saminather and Garry Smith of Bloomberg News.

A Section on 07/20/2014