Malaysian-International Tragedy

"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."
Vladimir, Grabovo, Torez, Ukraine

"Now you know who carried out this crime. We will do everything for the Russian military who carried out this crime to be punished."
Valentyn Nalivaychenko, Ukraine state security chief

"On behalf of the government of Canada, Laureen and I offer our thoughts and prayers to the families and friends of the victims of this outrageous act. While we do not yet know who is responsible for this attack, we continue to condemn Russia's military aggression and illegal occupation of Ukraine, which is at the root of the ongoing conflict in the region."
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper A man works at putting out a fire at the site of the plane crash

The Boeing 777 of Malaysian Airlines took off from Schipol, Netherlands airport with 283 passengers and 15 crew, cruising at 10,000 metres when suddenly it disappeared from radar screens. "Blown out of the sky" said U.S. Vice-President Joe Biden. "MH17 is not an incident or catastrophe, it is a terrorist attack", stated Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko forthrightly. His armed forces, he stated grimly, did not fire at any "targets in the sky".

Ukraine had intercepted calls between two Russian military intelligence officers, where, said Ukraine security services, rebel commander Igor Bezler informed a Russian military intelligence officer that rebel forces had shot down a plane. Another communication had two rebel fighters conveying the information that the rocket attack had been carried out by a unit of insurgents 24 kilometres north of the crash site.


A Buk surface-to-air missile was used to bring down the Malaysian Airlines passenger jet. The very type of powerful missile that had been captured by the rebels from Ukraine weeks earlier, the cause of much celebration by the rebels. Among those aboard the flight and consequently now dead, were 23 Americans, one Canadian, at least 154 Dutch citizens, and people from Australia, Malaysia, and Indonesia.

Moreover, security sources state that 150 vehicles including tanks, armoured personnel carriers and rocket launchers under cover of darkness on Sunday had crossed the border from Russia into Ukraine. That crossing represented one of the largest deliveries of military hardware to the separatist rebels in the last three months.