OM comes with new telephone taps about shooting MH17

The suspects in the MH17 case reported by telephone shortly after the crash that ‘their’ Book installation had shot down an airplane. This is evident from new telephone taps that the Public Prosecution Service presented on Friday.

The phone calls are the most concrete evidence to date in the MH17 trial of three Russian and one Ukrainian suspects.

The taping shows that the pro-Russian separatists thought they shot down a Ukrainian fighter.

At 4.48 p.m., shortly after MH17 crashed in eastern Ukraine, suspect Leonid Chartsjenko calls suspect Sergei Dubinsky. “We are on the spot. We have already brought down a ‘Soesjka’ ”, says Chartsjenko. ‘Soesjka’ is slang for fighter aircraft from aircraft manufacturer Suchoj.

“Good news, isn’t it, Igor?”

Later in the evening, at 19.52, Dubinsky calls suspect Oleg Pulatov. In it, Dubinsky asks, “Say, did our Book shoot or not?” Pulatov replied, “The Book shot down a Sushka after the Sushka shot down the Boeing.”

This is also the version that Commander Dubinsky passes immediately afterwards to prime suspect Igor Girkin, who led the armed forces of the Donetsk People’s Republic.

Dubinski: “The Sushka has hit the Boeing breeding and after that we shot the Sushka breeding with our Book. Good news, right Igor? ”

Girkin: “I don’t know, I honestly don’t believe this …”

Dubinski: “We’re going to be blamed for taking it down anyway, if you know what I mean.”

So much evidence

The Public Prosecutor’s Office presented the new evidence during a response to the investigative requests made by Oleg Pulatov’s lawyers last week. Lawyers Sabine ten Doesschate and Boudewijn van Eijck argued that ‘alternative scenarios’ – such as the possibility that MH17 was shot down by a Ukrainian fighter plane – cannot be excluded on the basis of the file. However, according to the Public Prosecution Service, there is so much evidence pointing towards a Russian Book missile that other versions do not need further investigation. For example, public prosecutor Thijs Berger showed that a fragment of a Boek missile was found in the rebate of one of the cockpit windows of the Boeing-777 of Malaysia Airlines.

On July 3, the court will let you know which investigation wishes of the defense have been granted. It is not yet clear when the substantive treatment will start.