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In symbolic rulings, Moscow was again blamed for the downing of Flight MH17 in 2014 and for an array of war-related human rights violations, including the transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia.
July 9, 2025Updated 9:21 a.m. ET
A European court on Wednesday found Russia responsible for the 2014 downing of a passenger jet over eastern Ukraine as well as broader human rights violations related to its war on its neighbor, rulings that were largely symbolic but highlighted Moscow’s increasing isolation.
The European Court of Human Rights ruled in four cases filed by Ukraine and the Netherlands against Russia over its meddling in Ukraine, from the Flight MH17 disaster to the transporting of Ukrainian children to Russia.
The court’s conclusions shed light on the scale of Russian involvement in separatist fighting in eastern Ukraine in 2014 — years before its full-scale invasion in 2022.
Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur was shot down over separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine in July 2014, killing all 298 people on board, most of them Dutch. In 2022, a Dutch court found that a so-called Buk antiaircraft missile system provided to separatist forces by the Russian military had brought down the Boeing 777.
In May this year, the U.N.’s aviation body found Russia responsible for the downing.
In its unanimous ruling, the European court said that the missile was fired “either by a member of the Russian military crew of the Buk truck” or Russia-backed separatists. The court said it was “not necessary” for it to examine who exactly fired missile, since the Russian state controlled both its military and the separatists.
The Dutch foreign ministry in a statement on Wednesday hailed the verdict as “an important step on the road to justice.”
