The Russian Investigative Committee - equivalent of the FBI - is calling for Captain Vladislav Voloshin to take a lie-detector test and face formal questioning, asserting there is compelling evidence against him which should be considered by the Dutch-led official probe.

Believed to be in his late 20s, he was named by stems from a 'secret witness' at his Dnipropetrovsk air base who says the pilot took off in his Su-17 combat jet on 17 July last year armed with air-to-air missiles.

He returned without them soon after the Boeing 777 was blasted out of the sky, it is alleged.

After landing Voloshin was 'scared', muttering that the incoming 'aircraft' - supposedly MH17 - 'was in the wrong place at the wrong time', according to the unnamed Ukrainian serviceman, now under guard at a secret location in Russia.

The Investigative Committee, headed by Alexander Bastrykin, a former classmate of Vladimir Putin, insists that the witness has passed a polygraph test and his testimony is credible.

Volshin has not spoken directly on the loss of MH17 but denied through his superiors that he was responsible. Ukraine blames Russia for a crude propaganda stunt in naming him.

Since the horror, Moscow has repeatedly claimed that MH17 was shot down by a Ukrainian warplane in the skies close to the Malaysian plane, while also vigorously denying the West's analysis that it was hit by a BUK missile fired by pro-Moscow rebels.

The pro-Moscow rebel media in eastern Ukraine has already branded Voloshin as 'the pilot who shot down MH17', showing archive footage of him which it labels 'the future executioner'.

'Let Voloshin take a lie-detector test with Dutch or Malaysian experts,' demanded Investigative Committee's spokesman Vladimir Markin.

'Representatives of the Russian Investigative Committee are ready to leave for Ukraine at short notice with all necessary equipment for testing pilot Voloshin and all others who might know anything about the crash.'

He demanded that the Ukrainian military should make a full disclosure of its flight logs on 17 July, the day MH17 was shot down, and allow Russia to interrogate its air traffic controllers.

Referring to Ukrainian secret services, he said: 'We're waiting for a response from the SBU.'

SBU official Markiyan Lubkivskyi insisted Voloshin was not engaged in combat flights on 17 July, the day MH17 was downed, and had not used weapons against aerial targets in the current conflict.

(dailymail.co.uk)