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by 82_28 » Mon Apr 03, 2017 4:56 am
by seemslikeadream » Thu May 24, 2018 8:08 am
MH17 missile owned by Russian brigade, investigators say
In 2015, the Dutch Safety Board released an animated video showing the flight path of the plane
The missile that downed a Malaysia Airlines flight over eastern Ukraine in 2014 belonged to a Russian brigade, international investigators say.
For the first time, the Dutch-led team said the missile had come from a unit based in western Russia.
All 298 people on board the Boeing 777 died when it broke apart in mid-air flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.
It was hit by a missile fired from rebel-held territory in Ukraine. Russia says none of its weapons was used.
But on Thursday Wilbert Paulissen, a Dutch official from the Joint Investigation Team (JIT), told reporters: "All the vehicles in a convoy carrying the missile were part of the Russian armed forces."
He restated the JIT's conclusion that the plane had been destroyed by a Russian-made Buk missile, adding that it had been supplied by the country's 53rd anti-aircraft brigade in Kursk.
At a news conference in the Dutch city of Utrecht, the investigators also showed social media pictures which they said traced the route the missile convoy had taken to reach eastern Ukraine.
What happened to MH17?
The incident occurred at the height of the conflict between government troops and pro-Russian separatists.
The plane left Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport on 17 July 2014 and was due to arrive at Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia on the following day.
Malaysia plane crash: What we know
MH17: Our special report
Who were the victims?
The plane lost contact with air traffic control about 50km (30 miles) from the Russia-Ukraine border.
It crashed in the Donetsk area, in territory controlled by pro-Russian separatists.
Footage was later released by the Ukrainian government suggesting that a Buk missile had been brought in from Russia on the day of the crash, and then taken back across the border the next day.
What has been said about the incident?
In October 2015 the Dutch Safety Board concluded that the plane had indeed been hit by a Buk missile.
How does a Buk missile system work?
In September 2016, the JIT - which includes officials from the Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, Malaysia and Ukraine - reached a similar conclusion in a preliminary report.
It said it had "irrefutable evidence" that the missile had been brought in from Russian territory and fired from a field controlled by pro-Russian fighters.
The investigators simulated various trajectories of the warhead. They showed it had exploded metres above the aeroplane's nose, showering the aircraft with fragments.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-44235402
International investigators confirm what Bellingcat already discovered: MH17 was brought down by Russia's 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade
A press conference on Thursday by the Joint Investigative Team stated what has become obvious for many observers around the world: the Buk missile that shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over Ukraine in 2014, killing all 298 people on board, was fired from a Russian military unit. The announcement on May 24 pinned the deadly incident on Russia's 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade.
Open-source researchers at Bellingcat had already identified the same brigade as the likely source of the missile. Russia has denied any military role in eastern Ukraine, despite compelling evidence to the contrary.
https://meduza.io/en/news/2018/05/24/in ... le-brigade
by seemslikeadream » Fri May 25, 2018 4:04 pm
Netherlands, Australia hold Russia liable for downing MH17
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — A day after international prosecutors said they had unequivocal evidence of Russian involvement in the downing of a Malaysian passenger jet over Ukraine nearly four years ago, the Netherlands and Australia on Friday announced they were holding Moscow legally responsible for its role in the missile attack.
The move puts further strain on already tense relations between Russia and the West and opens a new legal front in the long-running process of apportioning blame for the July 17, 2014, missile strike that blew Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 out of the sky and killed all 298 people on board.
“State responsibility comes into play when states fail to uphold provisions of international law and that’s clearly the case,” Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte told reporters in The Hague.
On Thursday, a Dutch-led international team of investigators said they had strong evidence that the Buk missile system that brought down the Amsterdam-Kuala Lumpur flight came from a Russia-based military unit, the 53rd anti-aircraft missile brigade based in the Russian city of Kursk. It was the most explicit link yet published by the investigators between Moscow and the downing of the flight known as MH17.
Rutte demanded that Moscow fully cooperate with the criminal probe.
Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop called for international support for the Dutch-Australian legal initiative.
“If military weapons can be deployed and then used to bring down civilian aircraft in what was essentially a war zone, then international security is at risk and we call on all countries to inform the Russian Federation that its conduct is unacceptable,” she said.
The two nations quickly got support from allies including the United States, Britain and the European Union.
“It is time for Russia to acknowledge its role in the shooting down of MH17 and to cease its callous disinformation campaign,” U.S. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in a statement.
British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson called Russia’s involvement “an egregious example of the Kremlin’s disregard for innocent life” and called on Moscow to cooperate fully with the investigation.
Russia denies involvement in the downing of the Malaysian Boeing 777 that was flying 33,000 feet (about 10,000 meters) over war-ravaged eastern Ukraine when it was torn apart by a Buk missile fired from territory controlled by pro-Russian rebels.
Bodies, debris and burning wreckage rained out of the sky and into a field of sunflowers near the rebel-held village of Hrabove in the Donetsk region about 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the Russian border, where fighting had been raging for months.
Speaking at a business forum in St. Petersburg, Russian President Vladimir Putin denied Russia was responsible for downing MH17. He said the Ukrainian military could have been responsible, noting a 2001 incident in which the Ukrainian army accidentally downed a Russian airliner over the Black Sea, killing all 78 people on board.
Putin said Russia would not trust the investigation’s final findings because Russia is excluded from the investigative team.
“We aren’t taking part in it, and our arguments haven’t been accepted by the investigative commission,” he said.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told reporters that Moscow has cooperated with the criminal probe and sent data including radar images from the day the plane was shot down.
Goran Sluiter, a professor of international criminal law at the University of Amsterdam, said the legal move appears aimed at least in part at pressing Russia to cooperate with the investigation, but was not without risks.
“It’s getting a bit blurred because there’s a state responsibility claim now interfering with a criminal investigation,” Sluiter said.
He said it would be tough to pursue Moscow in court. The most likely legal venue would be the Hague-based International Court of Justice, which settles disputes between nations. The United Nations’ top judicial body can only rule, however, if both sides accept its jurisdiction, or if it can be established that Russia breached a treaty to which it is a party and that includes a clause sending disputes to the ICJ.
Ukraine already has gone to the ICJ in a case that, among other demands, seeks compensation for the downing of MH17 from Russia. Moscow argued that the court does not have jurisdiction. Judges have not yet issued a definitive ruling but said in a preliminary decision in April 2017 that they appear to have jurisdiction based on a treaty cited by Kiev.
Relatives of those killed welcomed the legal developments over the last two days as the fourth anniversary of losing their loved ones approaches.
“This is great news,” said Hans de Borst, who lost his daughter, Elsemiek. “I understand why the government waited, but now the evidence is clear.”
Silene Fredriksz-Hoogzand, whose son Bryce and his girlfriend were on board the flight, called the investigation’s findings an important step forward and the decision to hold Russia responsible “two steps forward.”
https://www.apnews.com/4b05cd0e43c84e74822ebf1356337cdf
by seemslikeadream » Sat May 26, 2018 6:39 am
Russian GRU officer tied to 2014 downing of passenger plane in Ukraine
By Kevin G. Hall
In a Tuesday, July 14, 2015 photo, an employee of water station examines large piece of MH17 plane, which had not been taken away at the Malaysian Airlines MH-17 plane crash site toward Hrabove village, eastern Ukraine. Memories of the downing of the Malaysian Airlines plane one year ago still haunt the residents of Hrabove, who remember the bodies that fell from the sky above their sleepy village in eastern Ukraine.
In a Tuesday, July 14, 2015 photo, an employee of water station examines large piece of MH17 plane, which had not been taken away at the Malaysian Airlines MH-17 plane crash site toward Hrabove village, eastern Ukraine. Memories of the downing of the Malaysian Airlines plane one year ago still haunt the residents of Hrabove, who remember the bodies that fell from the sky above their sleepy village in eastern Ukraine. AP Photo
A mysterious man wanted in connection with the deadly downing of Malaysia Air Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine in 2014 appears to be a high-level Russian military intelligence officer, an investigation by a team of reporting outlets has found.
The reporting team, made up of McClatchy and investigative websites Bellingcat in Great Britain and The Insider in Moscow, identified the man, previously known only by his call sign Orion, as Oleg Vladimirovich Ivannikov.
Information about Orion has been long sought by a five-nation Joint Investigation Team conducting a criminal probe of the tragedy.
That body, citing several unique markers on photographs of a Russian BUK launcher taken in the border area near the wreck, on Thursday formally accused a specific division of the Russian military of bringing down the passenger aircraft, killing all 298 aboard. The head of Holland's National Investigation Service called on witnesses to help identify those who gave orders.
"Who formed part of the crew? With what instruction did they set out? Who was responsible for the operational deployment of this" missile launcher, Wilbert Paulissen asked.
Russia’s defense ministry said that “Russian BUKs never crossed Ukraine border.”
The July 17, 2014, missile strike on a plane full of passengers from 17 countries flying above 30,000 feet from Amsterdam to the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur shocked the world. Ukrainian leaders blamed Russia or ethnic Russian separatists.
Since the five-nation team hopes to bring criminal charges, identifying the chain of command in the plane’s downing is vital. Made up of representatives from the Netherlands, Ukraine, Malaysia, Belgium and Australia, the team did not know Orion’s identity on Thursday when pinning the missile strike on Russia.
Orion was captured on cell phone intercepts with a semi-retired three–star Russian major general who used the call sign Delfin on the day of and in the days after the shootdown. A report published last December by the collaborating news outlets identified Nikolai Federovich Tkachev as Delfin, the general and one of two senior officers who oversaw the movements of the BUK rocket launcher.
In the intercepts, Orion and Delfin discuss transport of equipment like trailers across the border without mentioning BUKs. Orion complains that the military men bringing the trailers were using a map of Ukraine from 1982.
However, the day after the shootdown, the Ukrainian security service published an intercept dated two days before the incident in which Orion explicitly says "we got a BUK now. . . so we start shooting the hell out of their planes."
When a member of the reporting team called Ivannikov for comment, a relative said to call back later in the day. But Ivannikov refused to come to the phone later.
The Russian Defense Ministry issued a statement to state press agencies late Friday local time, dismissing the telephone intercepts between Orion and Delfin as "an old fake." Quoting the defense ministry, the Russian news site tvzvezda.ru,a nationwide TV network owned by the ministry, said Friday that the officers identified by the reporting parties in stories that ran in December and Friday were "long ago dismissed from military service." The site added that the ministry "has no information about the type of their occupation outside the armed forces."
That contradicts public information in Russia cited in the December report that Tkachev was not fired, but received a prestigious award from Russian leader Vladimir Putin in 2012 and moved into reserve status.
From Orion to Ivannikov
Reporting partners have determined with a high degree of probability that Orion is the Russian citizen Ivannikov, born in 1967 in what was East Germany, the son of a decorated Soviet major general.
Ivannikov’s true name has remained hidden in part because, like other Russian officers in the GRU military intelligence unit, he does not operate under his true identity.
Instead, Ivannikov appears to have been using an alternate identity: Andrey Ivanovich Laptev. Under that assumed name, he helped lead an uprising of ethnic Russians in South Ossetia, a breakaway region of the former Soviet republic of Georgia. He was effectively part of what would become a private Russian shadow army that later fought in Ukraine and even later in Syria, where they took a strike in February from U.S. warplanes.
Several English-language publications and books reference a man known as Andrey Laptev as having first been the chief of staff for a South Ossetian security council from 2004 to 2006 and then until 2008 serving as “defense minister” for separatist forces in the self-proclaimed Republic of South Ossetia.
Yet Laptev appears in no photographs from the breakaway region, though the conflict stretched over more than four years. He has virtually no Internet or social-media footprint under that name.
That invisibility is one clue to Laptev's GRU connection. Russian military personnel who’ve left conflict zones are generally promoted, appearing in military publications or on websites receiving awards, promotions or teaching positions at military academies
About the time Laptev/Ivannikov is last linked to South Ossetia in 2013, ethnic Russian separatist activity in eastern Ukraine flared. And that’s where Orion, or Andrey Ivanovich, came into view.
In September 2016, the Dutch-led Joint Investigation Team released what it said were telephone intercepts of two Russian speakers_ Delfin and Orion_ and asked for the public’s help in learning their true identities.
Five-nation investigative team seeks help identifying commanders
This recording, released in September 2016 by the Dutch-led Joint Investigation Team, shows officers with the call signs Delfin and Orion discussing movement of equipment thought tied to a missile launcher. JIT
The Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta in July 2015 concluded that based on interviews with former separatists, Orion was a Russian military adviser. And since such advisers don’t operate in war theaters under their real names, it has been assumed Andrey Ivanovich was an alias.
The break in identifying Orion came through cellphone data, obtained by Bellingcat, that contained the mobile number Orion used in one of the intercepts. There were “hits” for this number in two publicly available phone-sharing apps. (Bellingcat's longer report provides greater detail.)
In one app, the number appeared under “Andrey Ivanovich-GRU from Husky.” In another app, the same number appeared under the name “Ivannikov.” Bellingcat and The Insider later identified a special operations unit of Russian separatists in Ukraine using the call sign “Huski,” for the dog breed popular in Russia.
Additionally, the number associated with “Ivannikov” appears in an online telephone database and on a now-defunct e-commerce website that left its customer and order data exposed. On that website, the same phone number appears in a customer profile of “Oleg,” who ordered an "elevation training mask."
A reporter from The Insider went to the delivery address listed on the order; it didn't exist. But the road continued under another name, and the street number corresponded to the entrance to the Main Intelligence Directorate of the GRU.
That Moscow address — Khoroshevskoye Shosse 76, Khodinka — is the same one listed in sanctions paperwork issued by the U.S. Treasury Department on Dec. 29, 2016, as part of the Obama administration’s retaliation for Russia's meddling in the U.S. elections.
The reporting partners also traced the same cellphone number to a dwelling across from a military intelligence institute; the structure appears on the social-media profile of one of Ivannikov’s relatives living at the same address.
Automobile registration records dating back 15 years from Rostov-on-Don, almost 600 miles straight south of Moscow, helped to confirm other key details about Ivannikov’s past. Passport records in Russia show he graduated in 1988 from the Kiev Military Aviation Engineering Academy in what today is Ukraine.
Other documents obtained by the reporting team show Ivannikov got a post-graduate degree in 1990 from the academy’s rocket division and in 2008, after leaving South Ossetia, wrote a Ph.D thesis about information warfare at the Southern Federal University in Rostov-on-Don.
Identifying Oleg
The reporting team also secured two photos of Ivannikov, one from 2012 and one from his 2003 passport application.
In the reporting team’s prior stories, intercepts were compared against videos or secretly recorded conversations to determine high likelihoods of a match. In the case of Ivannikov, the University of Colorado-Denver’s Center for Media Forensics determined intercepts were too short or too noisy for proper comparison.
Among the factors pointing to Laptev/ Ivannikov, however, is the fact that he has an unusually high-pitched voice that can make it difficult to tell if a man or woman is talking.
Audio clip of Orion, man believed to be Russian GRU officer.
This audio clip captures a phone call to Oleg Vladimirovich Ivannikov. It was too short for forensic verification but bears the hallmarks of the man captured in an intercept with the call sign Orion around the downing of MH Flight 17. Bellingcat / The Insider
The Insider confirmed with a former member of the breakaway South Ossetian government that the man they knew as Laptev had an unusually high-pitched voice. Another source in the region, who insisted on anonymity fearing reprisals, confirmed a photo of Ivannikov was the man he knew as Laptev.
In addition, Ivannikov prides himself as an academic. In July 2012, under his real name, Ivannikov became a director of the Russia-Caucus Research Center, part of the International Institute of the Newly Established States.
That Moscow-based think tank publishes papers supportive of Russia’s sphere of influence over its many neighbors. Ivannikov has published more than 20 papers, which often cite his role as a “military expert.” Another director of the Center was a Pole arrested at home for spying for Russia.
As the reporting team neared conclusion of this report, references to Ivannikov on the think tank’s website, along with his articles, suddenly disappeared. An archived index of his writing can still be accessed.
A former high-level Kremlin official, demanding anonymity for fear of the Kremlin’s long reach, told McClatchy the tale of Orion/Laptev/Ivannikov should help open eyes about how Russia pursues its interests abroad.
"People in the West just don't have a clue," said the former official.
Partner Bellingcat in an investigative website in London that emphasizes open source and social-media reporting. The Insider is a Moscow-based investigative online news site.
Audio ties Russia to the missile that downed the passenger jet over Ukraine
Authorities obtained a phone intercept between Russian commanders, including person of interest code-named Delfin, ordering the movement of the missile launcher that brought down Malaysia Airline Flight 17 over Ukraine in 2014. Experts matched tha McClatchyMaureen Chowdhury/McClatchy
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation- ... 36174.html
by conniption » Sat May 26, 2018 9:33 pm
off-Guardian
(embedded links)
Published on May 25, 2018
Comments 70
MH17: “New evidence”, same issues
Nearly four years since the incident, and over two years since they last reported any progress, the MH17 Joint Investigative Team (JIT) have held a press conference. To underline their previous position – they still think Russia did it.
The timing of this statement could be seen as very politically convenient for the NATO allies and the Kiev regime. The West would have you believe that the proximity to the World Cup is purely coincidental. Whilst those suggesting that this is a great cover for Ukraine’s renewed shelling of separatists regions in the Donbass will surely be dismissed as “apologists” or “cynics”.
None of that is really the issue though.
Whether they truly have “new evidence”, or whether this is just a rehash of discredited Bellingcat nonsense, is immaterial. If the politically convenient timing is a coincidence or a stunt does not matter.
The most important point is that the JIT is fatally and irredeemably flawed.
The JIT, made up of investigators from Australia, the Netherlands, Malaysia and Ukraine…but not Russia, has obvious credibility problems from the outset. The presence of Ukrainian investigators instantly means the end of objectivity. You can’t have an impartial investigation when one of the main suspects is doing the investigation. That’s simple common sense.
It’s not just the presence of the Ukrainian investigators that taints the JIT’s findings either. The four countries involved have signed a joint non-disclosure agreement (NDA), which states that none of their evidence can be made public unless ALL FOUR of the national governments agree.
Essentially, Ukraine have a veto on whether any single bit of evidence they find ever sees the light of day. This is absurd.
This NDA isn’t just a rumour or bit of gossip either. It was reported here in December 2014, and confirmed by the Australian government in a letter:
SO: Any and all evidence ever brought into the public eye by the JIT has first been screened and okayed by ONE OF THE SUSPECTS.
As such, none of their evidence, analysis or conclusions can be counted as, in any way, objective, impartial fair or even accurate.
The whole operation is a farce, and an obviously politically motivated one at that.
by Elvis » Sun May 27, 2018 2:30 pm
You can’t have an impartial investigation when one of the main suspects is doing the investigation. That’s simple common sense.
by Jerky » Sun May 27, 2018 5:26 pm
by Jerky » Sun May 27, 2018 5:29 pm
by Elvis » Sun May 27, 2018 5:31 pm
by Jerky » Sun May 27, 2018 5:50 pm
by Elvis » Sun May 27, 2018 5:51 pm
those for whom a certain snide/aggro contrarian posture is more effective and convincing than any other set of evidence imaginable
by JackRiddler » Sun May 27, 2018 6:40 pm
Jerky » Sun May 27, 2018 4:26 pm wrote:Anyone who thinks having Ukraine authorities taking part in an investigation of a plane that was shot down OVER FUCKING UKRAINE is suspect is grasping at straws, desperately reaching for any possible grounds which might conceivably allow them to pretend like they honestly believe it wasn't the Russians who did this (when in fact it's monumentally obvious that the Russians are responsible).
J
by Elvis » Mon May 28, 2018 2:00 am
Jerky » Sun May 27, 2018 2:29 pm wrote:On the other hand, you COULD go on believing something that is the equivalent in stupidity as believing Ted Bundy was probably innocent because he wasn't allowed to take part in the investigation of the murders that were ultimately pinned on him.
It must be pointed out that the very premise of this strawman is wrong. A constitutional requirement exists for Ted Bundy's interests to be represented and his rights protected. A trial is an investigation, and Ted Bundy has the right to actively participate in his legal defense; Ted Bundy has the right—and he is expected—to examine and rebut the prosecution's evidence, and he has the right to introduce exonerating evidence of his own.by conniption » Sun Jul 21, 2019 7:32 pm
by Sounder » Sun Oct 20, 2019 5:52 pm
MSM MIA: The Ukrainian Oligarch, Right Sector Nazis, MH-17 and Joe Biden’s Son
Ah, the great unspoken. No branch of the US mainstream media wants to go there. Its two degrees of Kevin Bacon and surreal as hell. Its a multi-billionaire Geneva based Jewish Ukrainian oligarch Igor Kolomoisky who finances the volunteer far right national guard Right Sector Aidar battalions in Ukraine that are implicated in having killed over 10,000 ethnic Russian civilians over two and a half years of civilian slaughter.
Its that same oligarch being the head of the European Council of Jewish Communities and employing the coke sniffing, Ashley Madison website surfing son of the Vice President of the United States, one Hunter Biden, at an offshore Cyprus based company called Burisma Holdings while at the very same time $1.8 billion in missing IMF funds have been funneled to that same oligarchs offshore based Cyprus accounts. This information is all verifiable via reputable mainstream media outlets as shown below.
Its reads like a bad, really bad Tom Clancy novel doesn’t it? If the missing $1.8 billion has anything to do with Hunter Biden is still up in the air, but everything else is, unfortunately, verifiably accurate and comes from long term professional media outlets.........
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