Plane
carrying 295 people may have been shot down near Russian border but government
and separatists deny involvement
theguardian.com,
Shaun Walker in Kiev, Tania Branigan in Beijing, Alec Luhn in Moscow and
agencies, Thursday 17 July 2014
A Malaysia
Airlines passenger jet carrying 295 people from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur has
crashed in an area of eastern Ukraine where separatist rebels have been
engaging Ukrainian military forces in recent weeks.
Ukraine's
president, Petro Poroshenko, said the jet may have been shot down.
"We do
not exclude that the plane was shot down and confirm that the Ukraine armed
forces did not fire at any targets in the sky," Poroshenko said in a
statement.
Dozens of
bodies were scattered around the smouldering wreckage of the plane, near the
village of Grabovo, about 25 miles from the Russian border, according to
reporters at the scene.
Emergency
workers said at least 100 bodies had been found so far, and wreckage was
scattered across an area 9 miles in diameter.
"I was working in the field on my tractor when I heard the sound of a plane and then a bang and shots. Then I saw the plane hit the ground and break in two. There was thick black smoke," a witness, who gave his name only as Vladimir, told Reuters.
 |
| Emergency workers at the crash site. Photograph: Maxim Zmeyev/Reuters |
"I was working in the field on my tractor when I heard the sound of a plane and then a bang and shots. Then I saw the plane hit the ground and break in two. There was thick black smoke," a witness, who gave his name only as Vladimir, told Reuters.
In a
statement, Malaysia Airlines said Ukraine's air traffic control lost contact with
flight MH17 at 2.15pm GMT, approximately 30 miles from the Russia-Ukraine
border.
"Flight
MH17 operated on a Boeing 777 departed Amsterdam at 12.15pm [Amsterdam time]
and was estimated to arrive at Kuala Lumpur International Airport at 6.10am
[Malaysia time] the next day. The flight was carrying 280 passengers and 15
crew onboard." The flight also had a Dutch airline flight number from KLM,
KL4103.
Anton
Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine's interior minister, wrote on his Facebook
page that the plane had crashed in Ukrainian territory after being hit by a
missile fired from a Buk launcher. Associated Press said one of its journalists
had seen a similar launcher near the town of Snizhne earlier on Thursday.
Leaders of the self-declared Donetsk people's republic denied any involvement, according to Interfax news agency. A member of the republic's security council said rebel weapons only had the capacity to shoot down a plane at 3,000 metres and blamed Ukrainian military forces for the attack.
 |
| Credit: Guardian graphics |
Leaders of the self-declared Donetsk people's republic denied any involvement, according to Interfax news agency. A member of the republic's security council said rebel weapons only had the capacity to shoot down a plane at 3,000 metres and blamed Ukrainian military forces for the attack.
Poroshenko
called for a commission to be set up to investigate the crash. "This is
the third tragic incident in recent days after Ukrainian military An-26 and
Su-25 jets were shot down from Russian territory. We don't rule out that this
plane was also shot down, and we stress that the Ukrainian military didn't take
any actions to destroy targets in the air," he said.
Earlier on
Thursday, Ukraine accused Russia of downing one of its fighter jets inside Ukrainian territory.
Dmitry
Peskov, a spokesman for the Russian president Vladimir Putin, called
allegations that Russia had been involved in the downing of MH17
"stupidity".
 |
| Local Ukrainian TV images show smoke from the Malaysia passenger airliner that has crashed near the Russian border. Photograph: Universal News And Sport (Europe) |
Peskov told
the Guardian that the Kremlin would not make a further statement on the tragedy
because "no one knows" who is responsible.
Asked about
the possibility of further US sanctions in light of this bloody development in
the conflict in eastern Ukraine, Peskov said he could not rule it out.
"The
United States has recently been conducting a very non-constructive policy, and
their actions are very unpredictable," he said.
Speaking in
Delaware, Barack Obama said his administration was seeking "to determine
whether there were American citizens onboard".
"That
is our priority. And I've directed my national security team to stay in close
contact with the Ukrainian government. The United States will offer any
assistance we can to help determine what happened and why. As a country our
thoughts and prayers are with all the families of the passengers, wherever they
call home."
Earlier,
Obama and Putin spoke on the phone about new US sanctions imposed on Moscow
over its alleged failure to halt the flow of weapons and fighters to separatist
forces in eastern Ukraine.
Several
airlines, including British Airways, Aeroflot, Turkish Airlines and Russia's
Transaereo announced they would avoid Ukrainian airspace with immediate effect.
Lufthansa said it would steer clear of airspace over eastern Ukraine.
At least 30
Dutch-speaking passengers were on the plane, according to two travel agencies
which sold tickets for the flight. According to Dutch newspaper websites,
several Dutch passports were found near the scene of the crash.
The
Malaysian prime minister, Najib Razak, said via Twitter: "I am shocked by
reports that an MH plane crashed. We are launching an immediate
investigation."
The
country's defence minister tweeted that he was "monitoring closely"
claims that MH17 had crashed, saying: "No comfirmation [sic] it was shot
down! Our military have been instructed 2 get on it!"
The crash
comes four months after Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 vanished on a flight
from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board, two-thirds of them
Chinese citizens. It has yet to be found despite a massive international
search, which is still ongoing, but Malaysia Airlines has said it believes
everyone on board died when the plane crashed into the southern Indian Ocean.
The cause
of MH370's disappearance remains a mystery, with investigators suggesting the
plane was deliberately diverted from its course, but there was no way of
knowing whether the pilots were responding to an emergency or whether there was
malicious intent.
That
aircraft was a Boeing-777 – the same kind of plane as flight MH17.
In 2001,
Ukraine admitted its military was probably responsible for shooting down a
Russian airliner that crashed into the Black Sea, killing all 78 people on
board. A senior Ukrainian official said it had most likely been downed by an
accidental hit from an S-200 rocket fired during exercises.
In 1983, a
Soviet jet fighter shot down a South Korean airliner after it veered off course
into Russian air space and failed to respond to attempts to make contact. All
269 passengers and crew were killed.
In 1988,
the US warship Vincennes shot down an Iranian airliner over the Gulf, killing
all 290 passengers and crew, in what the United States said was an accident
after crew mistook the plane for a fighter. Tehran called it a
deliberate attack.
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— C.J. Chivers (@cjchivers) July 17, 2014
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