Painful visit to MH17 remains

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/>