DISINFO: The JIT ignored evidence supplied by Russia in MH17 probe
SUMMARY
The Joint Investigation Team has recently accused three Russian nationals of responsibility for the MH17 disaster, after years of ignoring hard facts and figures provided by Russian officials. All the evidence supplied by Moscow, including military paperwork, radar readings, and field experiments, point to Russia’s non-involvement in the tragedy. At the 19 June JIT press briefing, the Dutch prosecutor was forced to admit that Russia had, in fact, provided the investigators with information relating to the incident, proving that the BUK missile belonged to the Ukrainian Army and providing relevant radar data. However, the information was not taken into account.
RESPONSE
The report advances the recurring pro-Kremlin narrative on the MH17 crash. The evidence cited, namely radar data and the "field experiment" conducted by the Russian military company Almaz-Antey, is only a small sample of meaningless and contradictory claims advanced by Moscow since 2015, some of which have contradicted one another. See our debunking of these claims here, here, and here. At the 19 June 2019 press conference, the Dutch prosecutor was not forced to admit anything and simply acknowledged the fact that Moscow had supplied the investigation with purported evidence of its innocence. He goes on to say that the information was taken into account, but simultaneously "wasn't clear enough" to either supplement or challenge the JIT's findings (time: 1:14:30). For instance, the Russian radar readings did not include the actual firing of the missile (time: 1:14:45).