The day is already being remembered as 17/7, the Netherlands' own 9/11 – and so it was fitting that the centrepiece of yesterday's national day of remembrance for the 298 passengers and crew who died in the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 was a roll call of the dead.
Fully 196 of those killed when the Boeing 777 crashed in eastern Ukraine were Dutch, including one entire family of six. And, as more than 1,500 relatives and friends gathered to remember them, it was painfully clear the emotion remains every bit as raw today as it was four months ago.
One by one, or sometimes in pairs supporting one another, those left behind made their way to the microphone to add the names of their loved ones to the terrible record of those lost – often having only the resolve to utter a name before breaking down in tears and being helped away.
Others, such as Anton Kotte, whose son, daughter-in-law and grandson died in the disaster, managed a few more plainly heartbroken words. “We feel as if we have lost a limb,” he said, before a long pause, adding, “Luckily, our memories will never disappear . . .”
National tragedy
In a country as small, populous and tightly knit as the
Netherlands
, there are few who weren’t touched to some degree, either directly or indirectly, by the MH17 catastrophe. Despite its large size, yesterday’s televised ceremony had an unusually intimate, inclusive, almost consoling feel to it.
As they have at the repatriation of so many of the victims' remains, King Willem-Alexander and Queen Maxima led the official party, accompanied by the king's mother, Princess Beatrix – an iconic figure in this country who has always been regarded as a unifying presence.
Before the ceremony on the outskirts of Amsterdam began, Prime Minister Mark Rutte observed: "As a nation, we are still a long way from working through this terrible disaster. But, especially for the relatives, we hope that today will be part of that process . . ."
Later, addressing the packed auditorium, Mr Rutte recalled his own feelings of helplessness as the size of the death toll became clear in the hours immediately after the crash last July.
There had been, he said, an overwhelming sense that “those lives would remain forever unfinished, those voices would never be heard again, those passengers, their personalities, their talents, their friendship, their love, had all been taken – just like that”.
Diplomatic presence
Schoolchildren placed flowers next to 298 candles, one for each of the victims from a total of 10 grieving countries, many of which were represented at the ceremony by their diplomatic corps, as was Ireland by Ambassador
John Neary
.
If it were possible, there was an added poignancy to the ceremony following the return of five more coffins to Eindhoven from Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine on Saturday – and the revelation by foreign minister Bert Koenders that nine of the MH17 victims remain unaccounted for and may never now be identified.
“We cannot say at this stage when or even if we can recover the remains of those last nine passengers – but we will do everything possible in co-operation with the authorities in Ukraine to make that happen,” the minister said.
It came as little surprise to relatives leaving the ceremony that on a day for remembering, Russian president Vladimir Putin had re-ignited the controversy by insisting it was the Ukrainian government and not pro-Russian separatists who were hindering access to the crash site. Moscow, he told Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak, supported a full and independent investigation.
