KUALA LUMPUR: To help clarify the cause of the Malaysia Airlines crash in eastern Ukraine on July 17, 2014, the carrier published the flight's cargo manifest the following day.
According to the documents, there was no hazardous material on board MH17. In addition to the passengers and crew, the air freight included two dogs, five birds, four pigeons, cut flowers, ship spares, aircraft parts, household goods, courier traffic, diplomatic and regular mail, medical equipment and consolidations.
The forwarders with cargo on the aircraft (pictured at Rome's Fiumicino airport in 2011 by photographer Alan Watson) included Agility, Blue Water Shipping, Ceva Logistics, DHL Global Forwarding, Expeditors, Kuehne+Nagel, Panalpina, C.H. Robinson, DB Schenker, TNT Express and VCK Logistics.
The downing of the aircraft by surface-to-air missile, reportedly by Ukraine 'separatists', came 24 hours after the U.S. imposed further economic sanctions on Russia to encourage a resolution of the Ukraine conflict.
In addition to denying Russian banks and energy sector companies access to U.S. dollar-denominated financing, the U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has imposed sanctions on eight Russian arms manufacturers including Almaz-Antey – the manufacturer of the Buk surface-to-air missile system allegedly used to bring down the B777-200.
Other proscribed companies include the Federal State Unitary Enterprise State Research and Production Enterprise 'Bazalt' – a designer and builder of air launched ordnance; JSC MIC NPO Mashinostroyenia, a rocketry company involved in ground platform-based launches; KBP Instrument Design Bureau that creates precision-guided weapons; and Radio-Electronic Technologies that designs and produces weapons-control systems and friend-or-foe identification systems.
OFAC has also added several individuals to its sanctions list. They include Aleksandr Borodai, "the self-declared 'prime minister' of the Donetsk People's Republic"; Sergey Beseda, head of Russia's Security Service (FSB) Fifth Service; Oleg Savelyev, Russia's Minister for Crimean Affairs; and Sergei Neverov, deputy chairman of the State Duma of the Russian Federation.
The U.S. Treasury says any assets of the companies or individuals it has listed that are within its jurisdiction are, or will be, frozen.
