Judicial avenues for upholding the international rule of law: the downing of MH17 case

Abstract

The article seeks to identify the means in which key principles of the international rule of law are applied in practice. It postulates that the plurality of available legal remedies fosters the international rule of law development. The article evaluates the ongoing and potential legal proceedings against States in relation to the 2014 downing of flight MH17 and their interplay. With the exception of the individual and the Dutch inter-State application, three international bodies are currently tackling the dispute from a perspective wider than the MH17 incident – namely, the situation in Eastern Ukraine (and Crimea). The objective of this article is to showcase the different efforts to bring justice by ramifying the MH17 case within them. The article chiefly focuses on the ongoing proceedings seeking State responsibility – the International Court of Justice (ICJ), and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).