Australia’s Abbott vows to confront Putin over Flight MH17

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said Thursday he was determined to secure a one-on-one meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin to demand full cooperation in the investigation into the crash of a Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17 in Ukraine.

Abbott said he would hold a bilateral meeting with Putin as soon as possible either at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ summit in Beijing on Nov. 9-10 or a week later in the Australian city of Brisbane, where Australia will chair a G20 meeting.

“One way or another, I will take the chance to speak to the Russian president sometime over the next week or so,” Abbott told reporters.

Russian officials ridiculed Abbott’s threat last month to “shirtfront” Putin – using an Australian football term for a head-on shoulder-charge to an opponent’s chest – and insisted that Abbot would have no opportunity since no bilateral meeting had been scheduled.

In a joint news conference on Thursday with Abbott, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte also revealed that investigators had retrieved more human remains this week from the rebel-held site in eastern Ukraine where the plane was shot down on July 17, killing all 298 on board, including Australians and many Dutch citizens.

Australians and Dutch united

Abbott said Thursday that he and Rutte were united in expecting full Russian cooperation with the Dutch-led investigation.

“We don’t want the investigation ridiculed; we don’t want the investigation compromised or sabotaged,” Abbott said.

Rutte said he gave Putin a similar message as Abbot’s on the sidelines of an Asia-Europe Meeting summit last month in Milan, Italy.

“I used the opportunity again to tell him that I expect him to do everything he can to put pressure on the separatists to allow unhindered access to the crash site,” Rutte underscored.

During the meeting with Putin, Rutte said he compared the disaster to the Russian nuclear submarine K-141 Kursk which sank with the loss of all 118 lives aboard in the Barents Sea in 2000 and was salvaged by a Dutch consortium.

Rutte said Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak would also try to meet Putin during the APEC summit.