You're reading: US believes Malaysian plane shot down by surface-to-air missile

Washington believes that a Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 that crashed in Ukraine was downed by a missile launched from territory controlled by pro-Russian separatists, the U.S. Permanent Representative to UN Samantha Power has said.

The ambassador was speaking at a meeting of the UN Security Council.

The Malaysia Airlines aircraft carrying 298 people on a flight from
Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur crashed on Thursday in eastern Ukraine, close
to the Russian border.

Power said that she had data that the separatists were spotted hours
before the incident with an SA-11 SAM system (Russian-made Buk missile
system) close to the site where the plane came down.

She also said that before the crash the aircraft was transmitting its
assigned transponder code in line with its flight plan and that there
was nothing threatening or provocative in its flight.