PRESS RELEASE Beer advocaten - January 15, 2020
Russia has responded at the European Court of Human Rights to the complaint of the relatives of the victims of the flight MH17 air disaster.
In November 2018, Beer advocaten filed a complaint against Russia at the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg on behalf of a large group of relatives of victims of the MH17 air disaster.
Earlier this week, we received the written response submitted by Russia to the ECHR. The litigation document is in English, ninety pages long and accompanied by more than a hundred documents.
In its defense, Russia focuses mainly on formalities, such as whether the ECtHR may consider the complaint. We have been given the opportunity by the ECtHR to respond to this. It will not be able to consider the substance of the complaints until the ECtHR rejects Russia's formal defenses.
In a nutshell, Russia believes, inter alia, that (i) it cannot be proven that Russia was involved in the disaster of flight MH17 and (ii) Russia is not responsible for the investigation of the disaster and (iii) the ECtHR cannot therefore consider our complaint against Russia. Moreover, the defense consists largely of accusations against government-affiliated investigators such as the Dutch Safety Board and the JIT (Joint Investigation Team). These investigators would have based their findings on inaccurate information falsified by unknown persons. Private researchers (such as Bellingcat) are accused of doing the same. According to Russia, the results of all these investigations are unreliable.
For further questions regarding this press release, please contact Christa Wijnakker (phone +31207025824 or wijnakker@beeradvocaten.nl or Luchtvaartteam1@beeradvocaten.nl).