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Dutch Prime Minister Rutte and Ukrainian president Poroshenko
Last Tuesday, Dutch PM Mark Rutte attended a meeting with other world leaders in New York at the United Nations concerning the prosecution of those who are responsible for the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17. Rutte then posted this update on his Facebook page following the meeting:
"The government continues to work hard with international partners to implement UN Security Council resolution 2166 in order to get clarity into what happened to MH17 and to prosecute its suspects. In two weeks, on October 13th, the Dutch Safety Board will present the findings of the international investigation into the circumstances of the disaster, showing what caused the MH17 disaster. Earlier today I had a meeting with the political leaders of Malaysia, Australia, Ukraine and Belgium. Together with these countries, the Netherlands is working harmoniously on different alternatives for a trial."
Since Russia vetoed a UN resolution for an MH17 international criminal tribunal in late July, Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Julie Bishop, also present at the meeting in New York, said last week that members seeking criminal accountability for the MH17 crash may create their own prosecution tribunal - one that bypasses approval by the UN. "There are a number of permutations, and I can assure you there are a number of international criminal lawyers who are working on this," she said.

She added that the closest analogy to such a court was the Scottish panel established in the Netherlands to prosecute Libyan suspects after the explosion of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, on December 21, 1988, which killed 259 passengers and crew members, and 11 residents on the ground. That tribunal was controversial and flawed from the beginning, with dubious testimonies and blocked evidence leading to the eventual conviction of an innocent Libyan man, and giving rise to serious doubts that Libya had anything to do with that terrorist attack in the first place. In fact, given the lack of any conclusive investigation in the intervening decades, serious analysts have suggested that the downing of PanAm103 was actually a false-flag operation used to demonize Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. In another remarkable parallel with the downing of MH17, sanctions were imposed on air travel and arms sales to Libya by the UN Security Council in 1992, sanctions that were only lifted when Gaddafi bought off Western leaders for enormous sums of money.

While the final report has not yet been published, and MH17 investigators have repeatedly stressed that "it's too early to draw any conclusion at this moment", Ms. Bishop is certain that the plane was brought down by "a surface-to-air missile operated by Russian-backed separatists inside the Ukrainian border." These 'grieving' countries have been consistently pointing the finger at Russia since the incident, without providing any facts to back up their claims. The West's insistence on an international tribunal has less to do with prosecuting actual suspects than with finding ways to demonize Russia because the USA hates Russia because Russia threatens U.S. global hegemony.

These crocodile tears over the downing of MH17 are, however, being noticed by Dutch citizens. Rutte attached a photograph (below) to his post-meeting Facebook update that has been criticized by many as 'tasteless', 'monstrous', and 'obscene', with one citizen asking: "What is the point of this picture? If you do something like that right after a World Cup soccer match, I can understand that. But exploiting the MH17 disaster in such a jolly way is disrespectful." Another rightly said: "While the relatives and many others still mourn daily for the large and heavy loss of their loved ones, they are all smiles in this photo." Indeed, how can anyone take these people seriously?
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© Cynthia van ElkA happy bunch of 'aggrieved' political leaders
Meanwhile, the Dutch monarch, Willem-Alexander, gave a speech at the UN General Assembly in which he appealed to the world's nations to "show solidarity in the face of the refugee crisis," but of course completely neglected to mention the role his country played in creating the violence these millions of desperate people are fleeing from. He also failed to recognise what the EU President, Donald Tusk, admitted yesterday:
"For the first time in my political career I have heard politicians openly declaring that the refugees heading to Europe are their method of getting (us) to act a certain way. Some say that it's their method of weakening Europe as a political entity,"
The Netherlands is one of the world's largest arms exporters, supplying arms to warmongering clients such as the US and Saudi Arabia. In addition, during the first half of this year, Dutch-owned F-16s launched more than 350 attacks against targets in Iraq, ostensibly against 'ISIS', although they don't appear to have weakened the terrorists' grip in the northern half of that country.

These attacks have been increased in recent months, putting the Netherlands in the top three nations that have dropped the most bombs on Iraq - the other two being the chief crusader nations of 'the coalition of freedom and democracy': the US, and the UK. I'm not, however, holding my breath waiting for accurate numbers of Iraqi civilians killed by Dutch bombing runs...