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Soderberg: Facts In Malaysia Flight Crash Over Ukraine Will Take Time

Laurent ERRERA
/
Wikimedia Commons

There are very few verified facts yet as to what caused a Malaysian airliner to go down in Eastern Ukraine this morning, killing the 295 passengers and crew members on board.Nancy Soderberg, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, now a distinguished visiting scholar at the University of North Florida, says getting at the truth takes time.

“The first thing I’ve known from decades in government is the full story never appears in the first couple of hours," she said.

"The bigger picture is Russia is destabilizing this area, undermining our interests in Ukraine and acting like a 19th century imperial power rather than a 21st century stable democracy, and that’s in no one’s interest.”
 
Aviation officials say contact with Malaysia Airlines flight 17, en-route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was lost about 30-miles from the Russia-Ukraine border.

Soderberg says the whole area could become a commercial no-fly zone if it’s found Russian-backed militants brought down the plane.

You can follow Cyd Hoskinson on Twitter @cydwjctnews.

Cyd Hoskinson began working at WJCT on Valentine’s Day 2011.