KUALA LUMPUR: An anonymous benefactor has offered a US$30 million (RM96.9 million) reward for conclusive evidence on who shot down Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 on July 17, reports said yesterday.

USA Today said German private detectives, acting on behalf of the mystery client, have confirmed that the money has been deposited into a Zurich bank account.

Flight MH17 was en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur when it was believed to have been shot down by a surface-to-air missile in eastern Ukraine with 298 passengers and crew members on board. Two-thirds of the passengers were from the Netherlands.

Ukrainian and Western leaders have blamed pro-Russian rebels for firing the missile.

Last week, in the Dutch Safety Board in a preliminary report said the Boeing 777 crashed because of a “large number of high-energy objects” penetrating the fuselage, a conclusion supporting the theory that it had been shot down by a ground-based missile.

The United Nations Security Council is scheduled to discuss the downing of flight MH17 today.

Wifka, the private investigators, said on its website that the reward may be claimed in Zurich or “in a different neutral place of the whistleblower’s choice”.

Josef Resch, who runs Wifka, was quoted as saying in German business magazine Capital that the offer includes giving any whistleblower a “new identity”.

The US$30 million offer is larger than the US$25 million bounty offered for the capture of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

Wifka said its client wants precise information, such as who shot down MH17 on July 17. Other information sought includes who gave the order, whether there was  a cover-up, details on the circumstances that led to the shootdown, who was involved directly, where the weapon is and who cleared the shootdown. — The Malaysian Insider


This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on September 19, 2014.