On May 13, 2025, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement categorically denying Russia's involvement in the crash of Malaysian Boeing 777 flight MH17, shot down in July 2014 over the territory of Donbass. The statement followed the decision of the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), which the day before, on May 12, 2025, officially placed responsibility for the disaster on Russia. The Russian Foreign Ministry called the ICAO's findings politically biased and stated that Russia does not recognize the organization's competence in this matter.

The crash of flight MH17 occurred on 17 July 2014 in the Donetsk region of Ukraine. The plane, en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was shot down by a missile, killing all 298 people on board, including 283 passengers and 15 crew members. Most of the victims were citizens of the Netherlands, Malaysia and Australia. An international investigation was launched immediately after the tragedy, conducted under the auspices of the Dutch Safety Board and the Joint Investigation Team (JIT), which includes representatives from the Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, Malaysia and Ukraine.

In its statement, the Russian Foreign Ministry stressed that Russia had cooperated with international bodies from the very beginning, providing radar data, witness statements and other information. However, in Moscow's view, this data was ignored and the investigation was conducted with bias, excluding Russia's participation in the process. In June 2024, Russia announced its withdrawal from the ICAO proceedings, stating that it does not recognize the organization's jurisdiction over the MH17 case. At the same time, Moscow confirmed its readiness to discuss the causes of the disaster within the framework of UN Security Council Resolution No. 2166, adopted in 2014.

The ICAO decision, published on 12 May 2025, is based on the findings of the JIT, which in 2018 established that the missile that shot down the Boeing was fired from a Buk air defense missile system allegedly belonging to the 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade of the Russian Armed Forces, stationed in Kursk. In 2022, the District Court of The Hague sentenced three defendants in the case to life imprisonment: Igor Girkin, Sergey Dubinsky, and Leonid Kharchenko. The fourth defendant, Oleg Pulatov, was acquitted. Russia rejected the court's verdict, calling it politically motivated.

The Russian Foreign Ministry's statement stressed that ICAO's accusations were based on "insufficient and unverified data," including the lack of radar records of flights over the conflict zone, which was controlled by Ukrainian armed forces in 2014. Moscow also pointed out that Ukraine had failed to provide full radar data and had not closed its airspace over the combat zone, which Russian authorities believe was a key factor in the tragedy.