Grieving Dutch blame Vladimir Putin for mass murder

“MURDERERS’’ screamed the weekend headline in the major Dutch paper De Telegraaf as the country hurled its fury towards Vladimir Putin.

“MURDERERS’’ screamed the weekend headline in the major Dutch paper De Telegraaf as the entire country in mourning hurled its fury towards Russian president Vladimir Putin.

The Dutch are doubled over in grief and deep pain, having lost 192 passengers on MH17, scores of them children.

Pictures of rebel commanders, guns slung across shoulders, a smoke in one hand and in the other grasping a stuffed monkey that had been the cherished comfort to one of the 80 children on board has ignited an anger that had been quelled by shock ­immediately after the missile ­attack.

Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte, attacked here for his measured language towards the rebel separatists and the Russians who have funded and trained them, was more forthcoming now that those very people have their hands on his people’s treasures.

Mr Rutte said the handling of the bodies and the digging through passengers possessions was “too disgusting for words’’.

He added: “It is 35 degrees there, the bodies need to be recovered now. I want to see results, ­unhindered access and the repatriation of the victims.’’

Mr Rutte had a “very personal and very intense’’ telephone conversation with President Putin.

“I told him time is running out for you to show the world that you have good intentions, that you will take responsibility,’’ Mr Rutte said.

“Putin now has to show that he will do what is expected of him and exert his influence.’’

The traumatised families of the passengers had been severely distressed by the images from the wreckage in eastern Ukraine, 50km from the Russian border. Entire towns are quaking in shock. Hilversum, a town 35km from Amsterdam, lost three entire families plus the child of a fourth family: 25 victims in all.

‘‘I think the entire Dutch population (of 16 million) knows people who directly or indirectly were on board,’’ Mr Rutte said.

“There were 80 people under the age of 18, of whom 23 were under the age of 12 and three were babies. It is too terrible for words.”

But the Dutch have not been calmed by their leadership, especially given the tense Dutch-Russian relationship that was exacerbated by the vicious homophobic assault of a Dutch diplomat in Moscow last year.

“Put away the diplomatic words Mr Rutte, this is slaughter, why are we being so nice to Putin?’’ said Hans Hoofte, an Amsterdam local who yesterday came to lay some flowers at the makeshift memorial outside the Malaysia Airlines terminal at Schiphol Airport.

The Dutch foreign minister Frans Timmermans, who went to the crash site on Friday, met Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko in Kiev on the weekend to express the mounting anger of the Dutch people.

“Once we have the proof, we will not stop before the people are brought to justice.

“Not just the people who pulled the trigger but also those who made it possible. I think the international community needs to step up its efforts in this respect,’’ Mr Timmermans said. The newspapers are also ­reflecting the country’s frustration.

The Telegraaf opines: “The Netherlands should be banging its fists on the table ... the cabinet needs to make it clear to the world that we are seething with anger. This is terror, a war crime, mass murder!

“The Netherlands is acting in this crisis as if it is a little country and that lessens the impact of the prime minister’s words that he will not rest until the perpetrators are brought to justice.’’

The Volkskrant blames Mr Putin for the return of echoes from the darkest period of European history, where peace was built on the bones of millions of victims of nationalism, war and racism.

The newspaper says any belief that the European continent was distant to the far away conflicts was an illusion.