What did the MH17 murder charges mean?

What did it mean when prosecutors said four men would be charged with murder over the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17? The question was in the air on 20 June 2019, a day after the announcement was reported on 19 June 2019.

As reported at the time, the four accused were three Russians and a Ukrainian. They were to be charged with murder over the crash that killed 298 people on 17 July 2014. The trial was set to open on 9 March 2020 in Badhoevedorp, in the Netherlands.

The flight and its victims

The aircraft was a Boeing 777-200ER on a scheduled service from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. It was shot down 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.

Contact with the plane was lost about 50 kilometres from the Ukraine–Russia border. Wreckage came down near Hrabove in Donetsk Oblast, roughly 40 km from the border, in territory held by Russian separatist forces during the war in Donbas.

A date and a venue

The charges gave the case a concrete shape almost five years after the disaster: named defendants, a stated charge, a courtroom location and a start date in March 2020. For the families of the 298 people killed, and for Kyiv, the announcement marked a move from the question of how the plane came down to the question of who would answer for it in court.