Advertisement

PM calls for 'thorough' inquiry into MH17

The Local Denmark
The Local Denmark - [email protected]
PM calls for 'thorough' inquiry into MH17
A woman cries as people lay flowers and light candles in front of the Embassy of the Netherlands in Kiev on Friday. Photo: Sergei Supinsky/AFP/Scanpix

As the foreign ministry says no Danes were among the victims, Helle Thorning-Schmidt says the international community must reach agreement on how to hold the responsible parties accountable.

Advertisement

The Danish foreign ministry has said that it does not believe any Danes were on the Malaysia Airlines flight that crashed into eastern Ukraine on Thursday, killing all on board. 

A government official said that the foreign ministry had gone through flight MH17's passenger list and found no indications that there were Danish citizens aboard. Likewise, no one has contacted the ministry to report missing family members.

"We have worked closely with our ambassadors in the Netherlands, Ukraine and Malaysia to check all of the information and we have no reason to believe that there were Danes among the victims," Catherine Uttenthal of the foreign ministry's citizen services department (Borgerservice) told Danmarks Radio. 

The Boeing 777, travelling from Amsterdam Schiphol to Kuala Lumpur, was blown out of the sky at 10,000 metres, by what US officials claim was a Russian-made surface to air missile.

Malaysia Airlines on Friday afternoon released an updated list of the victims' nationalities. On board were 189 Dutch citizens, 44 Malaysians, 27 Australians, 12 Indonesians, nine British citizens, four Belgians, four Germans, three Filipinos, one Canadian and one New Zealander. 
 
PM calls for investigation
In a brief statement on Friday afternoon, Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt called for an "thorough and independent" inquiry into the incident.
 
"From the Danish side, we completely support calls for a thorough and independent investigation to be carried out soon into the circumstances that led to this tragic incident," Thorning-Schmidt said. "We need the international community to discuss what consequences there should be and how to hold those responsible accountable."
 
CNN reported on Friday afternoon that a preliminary classified US intelligence analysis concluded that the missile that hit the passenger plane was most likely fired by pro-Russian separatists within Ukraine. 
 
Even if that is confirmed, analysts believe the EU is unlikely to toughen its stance towards Vladimir Putin.
 
Philippe Migault, an expert on Ukraine from the Institute of International and Strategic Relations (IRIS) in Paris, says there are too simply many economic interests at stake for Europe.
“France like other European countries will condemn the incident and demand an inquiry as well as an end to fighting in the region, but they won’t go much further,” Migault told The Local. “I don’t think we will see any major change.”
 
“There are just too many interests at stake. The Economic interests between the EU and Russia are just too great," he said. 

More

Join the conversation in our comments section below. Share your own views and experience and if you have a question or suggestion for our journalists then email us at [email protected].
Please keep comments civil, constructive and on topic – and make sure to read our terms of use before getting involved.

Please log in to leave a comment.

See Also