• Military

• WMD Menu                           

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Operations
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• Intelligence
• Homeland Security
• Space

Dutch MH17 Prosecutors Want To Question Ukrainian Prisoner Who Fought In Donbas

By RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service September 04, 2019

Dutch prosecutors want to question a "person of interest" who is in Ukrainian custody they believe is directly connected to the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 five years ago over territory held by Russian-backed separatists in the eastern part of the country.

Volodymyr Tsemakh, who oversaw an air-defense unit among Kremlin-backed separatists in a town near where the jet came down, is at the center of a potential prisoner exchange with Russia, local media report.

"We would like to talk to Mr. Tsemakh and ask him questions, so we would rather have him available for the investigation in Ukraine," Brechtje van de Moosdijk, a spokeswoman for the Dutch-led MH17 investigation, told AFP and AP.

Numerous unconfirmed reports say a prisoner swap has stalled because the Kremlin is demanding Tsemakh's inclusion that would involve Ukraine receiving 24 crewmen, filmmaker Oleh Sentsov, and others whom rights groups and the government in Kyiv say are "political prisoners" in Russia.

Tsemakh is a Ukrainian citizen.

"He is now in Ukraine, in a Ukrainian prison cell and if he is being exchanged, of course its's hard to say that we can still question him," van de Moosdijk said.

MH17 was flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lampur when it was shot down in July 2014 with all 298 people on board perishing.

An international Dutch-led investigation has so far concluded that the commercial airliner was shot down by a Russian-made Buk missile that was fired in territory held by Moscow-backed separatists. Investigators maintain the missile system belonged to a Russian military unit and that it was transported from and back to Russia after being used.

Three Russians and a Ukrainian were indicted for the downing of MH17, and court proceedings in The Netherlands are scheduled for March, but the four suspects most likely to be tried in absentia.

Russia called the charges against the country's citizens "absolutely unfounded" and said the investigators based their findings on "dubious sources of information," accusing them of rejecting evidence the Kremlin has provided.

Tsemakh is not one of the four indicted.

Ukraine's SBU security service apprehended him on June 27 in the Donetsk regional city of Snizhne, which is held by Moscow-backed separatists and is 20 kilometers from the Russian border.

According to the Dutch-led investigation, the Buk missile was fired six kilometers south of Snizhne.

TV footage obtained by Current Time, the Russian-language network led by RFE/RL in cooperation with VOA, showed Tsemakh claiming that he was in charge of an antiaircraft unit and that he helped hide the missile system in July 2014.

He also shows the interviewer where the civilian airliner fell.

With reporting by AFP and AP

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/dutch-mh17- prosecutors-want-to-question-ukrainian-prisoner- who-fought-in-donbas/30145438.html

Copyright (c) 2019. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.