Obama issues demands to Putin
July 21, 2014
The US president called on his Russian counterpart to instruct separatists in Ukraine to ensure investigators full access to the wreckage of flight MH17. He also described the chaos surrounding the site as an "insult."
Speaking to reporters at the White House on Monday, US President Barack Obama said it was clear that pro-Russian separatists who control the territory where flight MH17 came down last week were continuing to prevent international investigators from gaining full access to the wreckage.
Obama said it was also clear that Russian President Vladimir Putin had a great deal of influence over the separatists, and that as such, he bore direct responsibility to ensure that they stop tampering with the evidence and start fully cooperating with the investigators.
Obama also described the general chaos that appeared to surround attempts to begin that investigation and how the bodies were moved to refrigerated train carriages as an "insult" to the families who lost loved ones in the tragedy.
"President Putin says that he supports a full and fair investigation, and I appreciate those words, but they have to be supported by actions," Obama added.
While he didn't directly raise the possibility of imposing fresh, tougher sanctions on Russia, Obama indicated that these could be in the offing. He said that if the Kremlin continued to back the rebels in eastern Ukraine, "the costs for Russia's behavior will only continue to increase."
Accusations traded
Meanwhile, the Ukraine and the West Russia continued to trade accusations with Russia about what caused the crash. Ukrainian authorities and Western governments have accused pro-Russia separatists of shooting down the plane using a surface-to-air missile system supplied by Moscow.
Russia struck back on Monday, saying they had proof that Ukrainian surface-to-air missile systems were operating in the area in the days leading up to the crash. They also said they had evidence that a Ukrainian fighter jet had flown to within three to five kilometers (two to three miles) of the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko denied this, telling US news broadcaster CNN that all Ukrainian planes in the area were on the ground at the time of the crash.
Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 crashed last Thursday, killing all 298 people on board. Of these, 193 were Dutch nationals.
pfd/mg (AFPE, AP, Reuters, dpa)