SCHIPHOL, Netherlands (CN) — Defense lawyers for a man accused of supplying the surface-to-air missile that shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 want their client to be acquitted, claiming the prosecution has had “tunnel vision” in the case.
Counsel for Oleg Pulatov, one of four men charged with murder and downing of an aircraft, told The Hague District Court on Wednesday that there was no evidence connecting their client to the tragedy and no actual fact-finding was done during the investigation.
"Our client is not the one who pressed the button, not the one who ordered the button to be pressed, not the one who authorized the button to be pressed and not the one who provided the weapon,” said lawyer Sabine ten Doesschate.
Along with Pulatov, two other Russian men, Igor Girkin and Sergei Dubinsky, and one Ukraine man, Leonid Kharchenko, are also charged with 298 counts of murder. The Netherlands has taken on the prosecution because nearly 200 of the victims were Dutch.
None of the men are in Dutch custody and Pulatov is the only one to have retained counsel. The other three are being tried in absentia.
According to the defense, the prosecution has refused to deviate from the narrative established by the Dutch-led Joint Investigative Task Force. “They seem to have tunnel vision,” ten Doesschate said during a hearing last week.
The international team concluded in 2018 the Boeing 777 was shot down by a Buk missile that originally belonged to Russia's 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade and was given to Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.
Ten Doesschate described the defense as being kept on an “extremely short leash.” According to her, the defense asked for 255 witnesses to be interviewed but only 27 of those requests were granted. Many witnesses have refused to speak to investigators for fear of reprisal or were only willing to testify anonymously.
Russian-backed separatists moved in 2014 to create two breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine, the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic. Moscow recognized both as sovereign territories just before launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine last month. Peace talks in Istanbul have shown little sign of progress.
Fighting conditions in eastern Ukraine made the investigation difficult. The defense pointed out that much of the wreckage from MH17 was never recovered and even the bodies of some victims have not been found. “The debris lay unattended at the disaster site for four months before salvage could begin,” said defense lawyer Boudewijn van Eijck at an earlier hearing.
The prosecution asked for a life sentence — rare in the Netherlands — for all four men just before Christmas last year. “Only the maximum sentence is appropriate,” prosecutor Manon Ridderbecks said.
The trial, which kicked off in March 2020 only days before the Netherlands went into lockdown in an effort to combat the Covid-19 pandemic, is expected to last until the end of the year. In May, the prosecution will have an opportunity to respond to the arguments put forth by the defense. A verdict is expected in the fall.
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