Dutch judges visited the shrapnel-pierced wreckage of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 for the first time in an “emotionally loaded” day for the trial of four suspects in the crash. Torn shreds of the front of the plane, which was shot down in 2014 over Ukraine, killing all 298 people on board, have been reconstructed on a wire cage at Gilze-Rijen air base in the Netherlands. The trial of three Russians and a Ukrainian over the downing of the Boeing 777 began in March 2020 but has moved slowly due to legal arguments. The suspects are being tried in absentia. “We realise that this visit to the reconstruction of MH17 as part of the official criminal process will be very emotionally loaded for relatives, ” presiding judge Hendrik Steenhuis said. “This is a reconstruction of an aircraft in which their loved ones were underway to a destination that they never reached because the aircraft crashed during the flight and all on board perished.” The judges inspected the outside of the painstakingly reassembled wreckage, still coated in Malaysia Airlines’ white, red and blue paint, and then climbed up a ladder to look inside at the damage. “The bench have not had a previous opportunity to view the reconstruction, ” judge Steenhuis said. Lawyers for the prosecution and defence, who have previously been allowed to see the debris, were then allowed to do the same.<br/>
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Qantas said on Friday it was considering a plan to reward customers who have received both doses of a COVID-19 vaccine with incentives like frequent flyer points or flight vouchers to help boost vaccination rates. The airline has said it will require all passengers to be vaccinated when it restarts international flights beyond New Zealand, in a policy that has been cricitised by the World Travel and Tourism Council as discriminatory. "We will ask people to have a vaccination before they can get on the aircraft... for international visitors coming out and people leaving the country we think that's a necessity," Qantas CE Alan Joyce said in November. Qantas is currently selling tickets to destinations like the United States, Britain and Japan from late December though that could be further postponed as the federal government has said borders may remain closed until mid-2022. "As a large company that relies on travel to put our people and planes back to work, we're obviously motivated to help with the national vaccine effort," Qantas chief customer officer Stephanie Tully said . "We're still thinking through how this would work, but the incentive could be Qantas points, Qantas or Jetstar flight vouchers, or status credits for frequent flyers."<br/>