THE HAGUE: Ukraine has failed to present new evidence to show Russia was involved in funnelling arms and money to pro-Moscow separatists and Kiev's case should be dismissed, the UN's top court heard Monday.
Similarly, Moscow's representative said, Kiev also failed to produce new evidence that Russia supplied a surface-to-air missile used to shoot down a Malaysia Airlines flight in 2014 which killed 298 people.
"Ukraine has failed to present substantial new evidence which will require the court to change its mind," Dmitry Lobach told the International Court of Justice in The Hague.
"This court has found Ukraine's case concerning terrorist financing implausible," Lobach said referring to a finding by the ICJ's judges in 2017.
Kiev in that year dragged Moscow to the Hague-based tribunal -- set up in 1946 to rule in disputes between countries -- accusing its former Soviet neighbour of supporting separatist rebels by giving them weapons and money.
This included supplying rebels with a BUK missile system which brought down flight MH17 on July 17, 2014, while on a regular flight between Amsterdam and Kuala Lumpur.
Ukraine also accused Russia of "systematic discrimination and mistreating" Crimean Tatar and other ethnic communities in the Russian-annexed Crimean peninsula.
The ICJ's 15-judge bench however in April 2017 rejected Kiev's bid for emergency measures to halt Russia's alleged funnelling of money and arms into Ukraine's war-torn east.
But the court, based at The Hague's Peace Palace, warned Moscow to protect ethnic rights in the Crimea.
On Monday another Russian lawyer said Kiev had also failed to present any new evidence that Russia was involved in shooting down flight MH17.
"Nothing has changed. There is no material new evidence," Samuel Wordsworth told the judges.
More than 13,000 people have died in fighting between pro-Moscow rebels and the Ukranian government that erupted after the ouster of a Kremlin-backed regime in Kiev in February 2014.
In the latest spat between the two neighbours, a Moscow court a week ago upheld extending the arrest of 24 Ukrainian sailors seized by Russia off Crimea last year.
Russia in November fired on and seized three Ukrainian navy vessels, capturing two dozen sailors near the Kerch Strait, as they tried to pass from the Black Sea to the Azov Sea.
It was the first open military clash between Kiev and Moscow since 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea.
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