The Buk missile that downed flight MH17 was brought from Russia and fired from a region in eastern Ukraine controlled by pro-Russian rebels, according to the Joint Investigation Team's (JIT) report released Wednesday by the Netherlands Public Prosecutor's Office.

Presenting the Joint Investigation Team's interim findings on September 28, the team's head, Fred Westerbeke, said the investigation had ruled out all other possible explanations for MH17's crash, which killed all 298 people on board.

Westerbeke added that the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) could not currently reveal all of its findings for fear of hampering its criminal investigations.  However, the investigation has identified about 100 people who are being looked at further.

Westerbeke said it is unknown how long the JIT investigation will continue or when it will be completed. He added that he thinks there is a “realistic chance” that those responsible for the tragedy will be prosecuted, although the venue for such a prosecution remains undetermined.

Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down on July 17, 2014, over Ukrainian airspace while flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.  All 298 passengers and crew on board perished.

The JIT further determined that the Buk missile system was brought into Ukraine from Russia shortly before the tragedy and then smuggled back to Russia shortly afterward.

Western investigators and Kiev have been claiming that pro-independence insurgents in eastern Ukraine shot down the aircraft, while Moscow has been denying the allegations and retorting the plane was shot by a missile from the territory controlled by Ukrainian government troops.

The JIT showed an elaborate 10-minute animation interlaced with photographs and videos taken in July 2014 that showed the Buk system being brought into Ukraine and arriving near the town of Snizhne. It further presented audio and photographic evidence that a missile was launched. Then the same Buk unit, with only three missiles, was traced moving by night back through the Ukrainian city of Luhansk and into Russia.

In Moscow, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told a news conference that the probe's findings showed that it was “biased and politically motivated."

On September 26, the Russian Defense Ministry released what it claimed was new radar evidence showing the jet was downed by a missile shot from territory held by Ukrainian troops.  The ministry announced that Ukraine was hiding vital data on the Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 crash and was manipulating the investigation of the 2014 catastrophe.