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Buk Manufacturer Study: Kiev Buk Missile Downed MH17 from Kiev-held Territory

June 2, 2015 (EIRNS)—The company Almaz-Antey, a Russian arms manufacturer which was sanctioned as the producer of the Buk missile which the West claimed shot down flight MH17 over Ukrainian territory on July 17, 2014, has released a study showing that the Buk missile which hit the plane was of a type produced in Ukraine, not in Russia, and from an area controlled by Kiev, not the rebel-held area as claimed by the West.

Sputnik reports today that the study also states that there were US satellites flying over the area on the day of the plane crash, and calls for the release of that data.

In a press conference today, the company showed that the missile in question stopped being manufactured in Russia three years before the company was founded in 2002. "During the first stage of our investigation, the type of system was established. It was a Buk-M1 system [NATO reporting name SA-11], a 9M38-M1 rocket and a 9m314 warhead," Almaz-Antey head engineer Mikhail Malyshev said. The Russian military uses Buk 9M37 missiles, he said. As of 2005, Ukraine had 991 Buk 9M38-M1 missiles, according to the report.

"We have conclusive evidence that the Ukrainian armed forces have this type of missile," Almaz-Antey general director Yan Novikov told journalists.

The study used comparative damage analysis of Buk missiles to reach their conclusion, and offered to carry out a field test with independent experts to confirm the findings, according to Sputnik.

"The key feature of the 9M38-M1 missile is that it creates a particular ’scalpel’-shaped area perpendicular to the missile’s direction," Malyshev said. "It was exactly its scalpel’s traces and impressions found on the plane’s skin that allowed us to find the missile’s approach trajectory with a high degree of probability," Malyshev added. He said that if the missile was fired from Snezhnoye, as Ukraine alleged, "the entire front end of the cabin would have been blown off."

"The shrapnel moved from the nose of the plane to its tail inside its fuselage. The left engine, left wing and partially the tail unit were damaged. Specialists concluded that the missile was moving with a considerable intersection of the plane’s flight path. That is, not from the front but from the side,"

Malyshev said.

These specifications of the 9M38-M1 missile shrapnel were previously classified. Almaz-Antey received permission to declassify the information from the Ministry of Defense, Almaz-Antey general director Yan Novikov said.

Almaz-Antey on May 22 had filed a complaint with the Luxemburg-based Court of Justice of the EU against the sanctions based on the lack of any evidence of the company’s involvement in Ukraine.

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