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Which law would govern MH17 damages claims?
Summary
A look back at the questions raised by families' plans to seek compensation from four suspects, and at a separate French espionage case involving Russia.
Which country's law should decide compensation for the victims of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17? As of 1 September 2020, that question was still open, and it shaped what lawyers for the victims' families said they would do next.
On 31 August 2020, lawyers representing the families stated their intention to seek unspecified damages from the four suspects charged by the Dutch Public Prosecution Service in connection with the incident. No claims had yet been filed. A Dutch District Court was to determine whether Dutch or Ukrainian law would apply.
The flight was a scheduled service from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. It was shot down on 17 July 2014 by Russian-backed forces with a Buk 9M38 surface-to-air missile while flying over eastern Ukraine. All 283 passengers and 15 crew were killed. Wreckage landed near Hrabove in Donetsk Oblast, about 40 km from the border, in territory controlled by Russian separatist forces during the war in Donbas.
A separate espionage case
Another Russia-related story surfaced in the same days. On 30 August 2020, French Minister of the Armed Forces Florence Parly revealed that an army lieutenant-colonel stationed at a NATO base in Italy had been arrested and indicted on espionage charges. He was reported to have supplied sensitive documents to an officer of the GRU, Russian military intelligence.
The two cases were unconnected in the reports from the time. Together, they showed Russia-linked legal matters moving through European courts and ministries at the start of September 2020. For the MH17 families, the choice of applicable law remained the first hurdle before any claim could proceed.
