“If the investigation by the investigating judge proceeds as expected, the court will begin to consider the merits of the MH17 case on Monday, June 7, 2021,” the Hague District Court said in a statement, quoted by RIA Novosti.
At the end of November it became known that the court will focus on the version of the incident, which was presented by judicial investigators, and does not plan to consider alternative versions.
Boeing 777, flying MH17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, crashed on July 17, 2014 in the Donetsk region of Ukraine.
Killed 283 passengers and 15 crew members.
In May 2018, the investigation team stated that MH17 was shot down by a 9M38 missile of a Buk anti-aircraft missile system, which was allegedly delivered to Donbas from Russian territory.
According to the head of the Main Missile and Artillery Directorate of the Russian Armed Forces, Nikolai Parshin, the missile that shot down the plane was produced in 1986 at the Dolgoprudny enterprise and sent to the military unit of the Ukrainian SSR, and did not return to Russian territory.
In June 2019, the Joint Investigation Team investigating the MH17 crash reported four suspects in the case.
The Russian Foreign Ministry called the JIT's accusations of "involvement" of Russians in the crash unfounded.