MH17 Malaysia will hold a national mourning day for the Malaysia Airlines (MAS) Flight MH17 tragedy once the remains arrive in the country, Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak said.
He said the mourning day was for the whole nation to grief over those who lost their lives in the crash, and to honour them.
Flight MH17, was flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur with 298 people - 283 passengers and 15 crew - on board when it went down in Donetsk, eastern Ukraine near the Russian border on July 17.
The Boeing 777-200 aircraft was believed to have been shot down, but until today no one has claimed responsibility for the heinous act.
"We will declare a day of mourning for the whole country and I will be there to receive the bodies when they arrive," Najib said at an appreciation dinner with the Malaysian special investigation team in Amsterdam last night.
Touching on the 195 Netherlands nationals on board the flight who had perished in the incident, Najib said he had met several Netherlanders, and they did not blame Malaysia or Malaysia Airlines for the tragedy.
"It is totally unexpected. The people of Netherlands understand this and they are with us," he added.
On his two-day working visit to the Netherlands starting Thursday, Najib said it was to offer condolences to the Netherlands and to have discussions with his Dutch counterpart, Mark Rutte.
Najib, accompanied by his wife Rosmah Mansor, Health Minister Dr S Subramaniam, Deputy Foreign Minister Hamzah Zainuddin, Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) director-general Azharuddin Abdul Rahman and MAS chief executive officer Ahmad Jauhari Yahya, arrived in Amsterdam on Thursday morning.
Najib discussed the MH17 crash in Ukraine with Rutte ( right ) in The Hague before moving to Hilversum to pay his respects to the remains of the air tragedy victims, who are undergoing identification and forensic process.
Najib also expressed gratitude to the special Malaysian investigation team, which had given its commitment to bringing the bodies of the victims to Netherlands, and was involved in recovering the MH17's two black boxes, and also to those who are engaged in the Disaster Victims Identification (DIV).
He said Malaysia was committed to seek justice for the families of victims and committed to bringing the perpetrators to justice.
With the recovery of the black boxes, he hoped information in the boxes could contain solid evidence to bring those responsible for the tragedy to justice.
- Bernama
