The court in the case of the downed MH17 will be ready to announce the verdict at the end of 2022, presiding judge Hendrik Steenhuis has said.
On Monday, at a hearing in Schiphol Judicial Complex, announcing the agenda for the upcoming hearings, in particular, with regard to the possible date of the announcement of the verdict, he said that usually, it will take the court two weeks to make its decision, but this is not possible in this case. That is why the decision will not be made in June 2022. How long it will take is not yet known, so the court reserved three dates: September 22, if not ready, then November 17 or December 15, 2022.
According to him, the current block will assign to relatives who use their right to speak, and this is more than 90 people, for which the court has reserved three weeks.
Steenhuis said that in the Netherlands, the right to speak to relatives in court hearings has existed since 2005. According to him, statements of this kind help to assess the consequences of such events. The court does not only discuss the consequences of the event but their (family) vision of events as such.
The judge also said the statements of relatives in court would be extremely emotional, because they lost relatives, and secondly because MH17 was shot down. The reason why it was shot down, who gave the order is the fact that these questions still did not answer, so their grief and anger grows. They will talk about those who have been lost, about the consequences of this tragedy. They will be extremely emotional. It is not easy to talk about it, being in such a center of attention. But, on the other hand, many of the parties they expected it, as Steenhuis said.
