Did ICAO warn the Netherland authorities about safety risks in Ukraine airspace?

At May 18 2017 Dutch parliament members asked 45 new questions to the Dutch goverment. While many questions were related to questions asked in the past, one question is interesting.

Question number 29 :

Klopt het dat er voor 17 juli 2014 informatie vanuit ICAO (Parijs) naar Nederland is verstuurd met daarin de waarschuwing dat het luchtruim van Oekraïne een risico was? Zo ja, kunt u dan aangeven wat voor een informatie dat was en kunt u die informatie openbaar maken?

Is it correct that befofe July 2014 information by ICAO (Paris) was sent to the Netherlands containing a warning the airspace of Ukraine was at risk? If so, can you explain what kind of information that was and can you make this information public?

 

Back in 2015 the Dutch Ministry for Infrastructure and Environment (IenM) answered that ICAO did not publish any information on the safety of Eastern Ukraine airspace prior to July 17, 2014.

International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) has its headquarters in Canada. It is an United Nations agency. The European branch is called ‘European and North Atlantic (EUR/NAT) Office’ located near Paris, France.

Aviation Week reported at July 18,2014 

ICAO says “it is always the responsibility” of member states to issue warnings or airspace and ceiling restrictions “based on what they consider to be potential threats to civilian air services in the airspace under their sovereign control”, says a spokesman.  “ICAO does issue these warnings under extraordinary circumstances, for instance where States may not be able to due to command and control breakdowns, or possibly where a State does not have good diplomatic relations with the States who need to receive the safety advisory and it asks ICAO to do contact these adjacent States on its behalf.”

Montreal Gazette reported at July 19, 2014 that “ICAO sent out a safety advisory to its 191 member states on April 2 about a potential air-traffic management conflict in the Simferopol region”.

This alert was because Russia troops annexed Crimea and took over air traffic control while Ukraine Air Traffic Control was the only legal organization to control aircraft over the area.

 

From answers in the past on questions by member of parliament Pieter Omtzigt we know that the   Aeronautical Fixed Telecommunication Network is not used by ICAO to communicate warnings to airlines and state authorities.

ICAO sends messages to states who signed the treaty as socalled ICAO State Letters. In the Netherlands the Ministry of Infrastructure and Environment (Ministerie van Infrastructuur en Milieu- IenM). is registered as central point of contact for those State Letters. IenM is responsible for futher distribution of State Letters to public and private parties for who the information can be relevant. If a State Letter has aspects on security of civil aviation, IenM send the State Letter to NCTV (National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism).

More information in these Kamervragen titled ‘Kamervragen van het lid Omtzigt over het Aeronautical
Fixed Telecommunication Network (AFTN)’ dated March 25, 2015.