by

At Friday August 19 2016 French pressagency AFP published the news that Dutch prosecutor will announce the first results of the criminal investigation into MH17 at September 28. Prior to the AFP report, at July 28 Dutch RTL Nieuws published an article stating the prosecutor will release results “end of September” without mentioning the specific date nor the fact there will be a pressconference.

While many foreign newspapers copied the AFP article (Strait Times, Zeit, Daily Mirror, Sputnik, France 24 are some) the Dutch media initially did not report at all. Which is weird as 196 people of board of MH17 were Dutch.

During the afternoon of August 19, Jeroen Akkermans, reporter for RTL Nieuws, picked up the news and sent a Tweet. Soon after RTL Nieuws was the first Dutch media who reported about the date of the pressconference.

Later on Friday also Dutch newspaper AD reported about the date of the pressconference.

So how come all other Dutch newsdesks did not publish the date of the pressconferene?

Two major newsdesks stated to me that it was already known end of September the Dutch prosecutor would make public the first results. The exact date of September 28 is not newsworthy.

This is interesting as RTL Nieuws was the only Dutch media who reported end of July about the fact the Dutch prosecutor will announce first results end of September. In the middle of the Dutch summer season, many Dutch people missed the RTL news.

At July 28 families of the victims received this letter sent by the Dutch prosecutor. It is an invition for a meeting at September 28. The letter says at the meeting the first results of the criminal investigation will be told to the families of the MH17 victims.

This letter was likely forwarded by someone to the RTL Nieuws newsdesk. RTL probably did not think it was important to mention the exact date and mentioned “end of September”.

Dutch prosecutor did not release a press release about this meeting. When asked for a reason, the spokesman did not provide a reason for not informing the press about the meeting for the next of kin. The spokesman stated “it is too early to invite the press for the September 28 press conference”.

At or just before August 19 someone of AFP probably noticed the RTL article and called Dutch prosecutor spokesman Wim de Bruin for comment and verification. De Bruin told AFP something which was not reported in press before, namely the exact date and that there will be a pressconference in the afternoon of September 28.

AFP then made an article which was published by many foreign media. Singapore Strait Times was one of the first who published the article. Newsstations in Malaysia, Russia, France, Canada and even Iran published it a couple of hours before Dutch RTL and AD copied the news.

Dutch blog GeenStijl reported about the lack of reporting by Dutch media here.

by