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The Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) today voted that the Russian Federation failed to uphold its obligations under international air law in the 2014 downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17.

This represents the first time in ICAO’s history that its Council has made a determination on the merits of a dispute between Member States under the Organization’s dispute settlement mechanism.

The Council agreed that the claims brought by Australia and the Netherlands as a result of the shooting down of Flight MH17 on 17 July 2014, were well founded in fact and in law. The case centered on allegations that the conduct of the Russian Federation in the downing of the aircraft by a surface-to-air missile over eastern Ukraine constitutes a breach of Article 3 bis of the Convention on International Civil Aviation, which requires that States “refrain from resorting to the use of weapons against civil aircraft in flight.”

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The case to the UN was brought in 2022 by the Australian and Dutch governments, who have both welcomed the ICAO’s ruling.

As the BBC reports, all 298 people on board the passenger plane were killed when it was shot down by a Russian-made missile … The majority of passengers and crew, 196 people, were from the Netherlands … There were also 38 people from Australia, 10 British citizens, as well as Belgian and Malaysian nationals on board …