President Putin, the Free World deserves an explanation!

By Ludy Astraquillo Ongkeko, Ph.D.

A unanimous condemnation on the unspeakable downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight M-17 — how it was shot down with 298 people on Board — has been demanded by the United Nations Security Council.

It’s time that the world makes the aforementioned demand. Indeed it is high time, President Vladimir Putin.

The UN Security Council has demanded nothing short of ‘full access’ to the crash site in rebel-held east Ukraine. Questions continue to run rife on how the passengers from different nationalities on board that ill-fated passenger airline were so senselessly killed.

Australia has spearheaded the drafting on the strongly-worded resolution that calls for an international investigation. In recent memory, the vehemence and urgency of that resolution has not been unparalleled.

“We must have answers. We must have justice,” Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop told the 15-member Council.

“Grief is now accompanied by outrage as we witness grotesque violations at the crash site; it is the worldwide resounding voice criticizing locations of gun-toting rebels ‘control access’ who have been shown combing through the victims’ personal belongings,” Bishop continued to state.

The aforementioned Malaysian Airlines passenger carrier is believed to have been blown out of the sky by a surface-to-air missile. Among those on that passenger manifest are 193 Dutch citizens and 28 Australian nationals.

Calling on all countries to cooperate with the probe, the UN Council resolution implicitly targeted Russia which stands accused of supporting the pro-Moscow rebels and is strongly suspected of having supplied the sophisticated missile weaponry. As a member of that same UN body, Russia’s representative ‘agreed to cooperate’ with the probe, an appeal that targets its home nation.

United States Ambassador Samantha Power, backed up unanimously by the UN Council, declared: “We welcome Russia’s support for the July 21st Resolution, but no resolution would have been necessary had Russia used its leverage with the separatists earlier, getting them to lay down their arms and leave the site to international experts.”

Mr. Putin’s ‘unconvincing words,’ have led global concern on how shootings have taken place over rebel-held areas of Ukraine. There is no mentality afloat all over the world who would dare contest how 298 people were senselessly killed.

Therefore, the question has been exacted at nothing short of immediate response from the president of Russia to show that those whose lives were lost ‘deserve far greater respect’ than what they have been shown by the Russian-backed rebels.

Although ‘some superficial reply’ has been shown, it was hardly expected from the Russians because the ‘callousness of the rebels, and by extension of their Russian sponsors,’ the entire scene labeled ‘response,’ by Russia has been called ‘outrageous.’

What has been required: the facts about the shooting down of the plane must be ‘established by trusted, international experts.’

What has been made emphatic by American and Western official investigators thus far: “There is strong evidence that the jetliner was brought down by rockets fired from rebel-held territory in eastern Ukraine.”

No further argument has been offered to contradict the opinion from investigators, marked with spontaneity: “Evidence shows not only ground-to-air missiles but also the expertise and equipment to guide them, raising the possibility of assistance from Russia itself.”

Therefore, in view of what has hitherto surfaced, Mr. Putin, don’t you owe the world fitting responses to the serious charges?

It has been widely disseminated that Putin has said: “Everything possible must be done to ensure that international experts can work in safety at the crash site,” but then, there are those who insist that the Russian president has said ‘many reasonable and conciliatory things since the Ukrainian crisis began, but he hasn’t done anything to rein in the thugs who have seized control of parts of eastern Ukraine, or to block the fighters and sophisticated weapons supplied them from Russia.’

In view of the Putin statements already aired, who is inclined to believe the Russian president?

Putin is under obligation to respond to the Free World.

Will he be expected to tell the truth?

Would that be subject to threshing out?

Owing to his recent stand when he has been consistent, as observed, because he has ‘cynically encouraged’ a dangerous secessionist conflict to grow until it has now become a’ world threat,’ why doesn’t Putin come forward?

Mr. Putin, reiterating: who believes you? It is up to you to put a stop to your Russian propaganda machine.

Malaysia, backed by practically the whole world except Putin, is calling for a thorough and zealous investigation.