Indonesian Police Arrives in Ukraine to Identify MH17 Crash Victims

Jakarta (Antara) - The Indonesian Police's Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) team has arrived in Ukraine to gather and identify the corpses of Indonesians who were on board the ill-fated Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 that crashed on July 17. Indonesian Police's Head of Information and Public Relations Brigadier General Boy Rafli Amar stated here on Wednesday that the team of seven personnel led by DVI's Director Senior Commissioner Anton Pastilani had departed for Ukraine on July 22. "According to the information, they have arrived in Ukraine. They are responsible to deliver the ante-mortem data of the victims' families, which is expected to speed up the identification process of the Indonesian victims," Boy noted. Boy explained that the ante-mortem data of the families' DNA samples will be used to assist in the postmortem identification of the corpses. During the next two days, the Indonesian DVI team will collaborate with the Malaysian and Dutch teams, as well as the local authorities in order to transfer the corpses to the Netherlands. "The main target of this team is to bring the corpses to the Netherlands to match the ante-mortem data from the families with the corpses' postmortem reports," remarked Boy. Boy explained that of the 12 Indonesian victims, there was only one family who had not yet provided the DNA sample since they lived in the Netherlands. "The DNA sample for identifying the victim named Mr. Hadiono is not yet available since his family lives in the Netherlands," he added. On Thursday (July 17), Malaysian Airlines flight MH17, which was on a scheduled flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was shot down in eastern Ukraine. The flight was carrying a total number of 298 people, comprising 283 passengers, including three infants of varied nationalities and 15 crew members of Malaysian nationality. Twelve Indonesians, including an infant, were on the ill-fated Malaysian Airlines plane, which was shot down over Ukraine. (*) *