RUSSIA has pledged that it would do everything in its power to facilitate investigations into the Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 crash over eastern Ukraine in July, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak said.
He said he and Russian President Vladimir Putin had agreed that the ceasefire between the government in Kiev and the eastern Ukraine rebels must be upheld to allow the investigation team safe access to the crash site.
“We are hoping that both sides will observe the ceasefire and allow the investigation team full access to the crash site. Unfortunately, this has not happened,” said Najib, who spoke to the Malaysian media here after meeting Putin and other heads of government at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ summit, which ended yesterday.
Najib said Putin had expressed sympathy to Malaysians and acknowledged that securing full access to the site was crucial.
“Malaysia has always taken an objective position. Instead of fingerpointing, we would wait for the final investigation report to conclude what had really happened to MH17.
“The interim report by the investigation body concluded that it was not an accident. The aircraft was brought down by a high-energy object,” he said, adding that more work needed to be done to identify the object as well as where it was fired from and who had fired it.
“We need complete access to the crash site so that we can reassemble the wreckage and look for the parts of the high-energy object, which was probably embedded in the fuselage or parts of the aircraft.
“The black box that was recovered indicated that there was no technical fault in the aircraft. It was flying in normal conditions. There was no Mayday call and the pilot was competent,” Najib said, adding that the government owed it to Malaysians and the victims’ families to put an end to the tragedy.
He expressed hope that Russia’s assistance would help conclude the investigation soon.
“It’s painful for Malaysia because we lost two planes in four months. We are hoping to work closely with all the countries in that area.”