They swamped Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai with questions on the investigation.
Liow said although the mood of the memorial was sombre, during the dialogue session, the families were determined to get more information on the ongoing investigation and find the culprits responsible.
“I think it was a very good dialogue, a very good get-together in memory of this MH17 tragedy,” Liow told reporters after the memorial.
Liow said he was convinced that at the end of the investigation, the culprit responsible for this heinous crime would be captured.
However, he also pleaded for the person guilty of striking down MH17 with a missile to step up and turn himself in.
Liow said the memorial here was held early because there would be another memorial in the Netherlands on July 17, to which all the victims’ families were invited.
However, he said not all families would be attending the event as they were required to make their own arrangements.
Malaysia Airlines Bhd chief executive officer Peter Bellew and its chairman Md Nor Md Yusof were present during the memorial at a hotel here today.
Liow said he had informed the families that suspects accused of the attack on MH17 would face prosecution in the Netherlands.
He added that the joint investigating team (JIT) countries – the Netherlands, Belgium, Ukraine and Australia – are now responsible for the investigation.
Liow said JIT had so far interviewed 200 witnesses and have been skimming through web pages, Facebook and Twitter to collect as much detailed information as possible.
MH17, a Boeing 777-200ER airliner, was shot down over the conflict zone in eastern Ukraine while on a scheduled flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur on July 17, 2014.
The flight was three hours into the 12-hour trip at the time.
It was cruising at 33,000 feet (10,058 metres), or 1,000 feet above the altitude restriction that air traffic controllers had placed over the region due to fighting between Ukrainian and Russian-backed forces.
A Russian-made surface-to-air missile detonated close to the Malaysia Airlines flight at its cruising altitude.
The explosion sent hundreds of pieces of high-energy shrapnel through the Boeing 777, which broke it apart. The plane crashed in a farmland in eastern Ukraine. All 298 people aboard were killed.
More than two years after the downing, in September 2016, Dutch investigators concluded that the jumbo jet was shot down by a Russian BUK missile system launched from rebel territory in eastern Ukraine.
Russia, which has denied any wrongdoing, said its own inquiry found that the missile had been fired from Ukrainian territory controlled by the Ukrainian government.
It also suggested that Ukrainian fighter jets could have downed the commercial flight.
The families of MH17 passengers and crew still await a judicial reckoning, which has been stymied by Russia’s efforts at the United Nations to block an international tribunal modelled after the one used in the 1988 terrorist bombing of a Pan Am flight over Scotland.
Last week, the five countries investigating the destruction of flight MH17 said a criminal trial, whenever it occurs, would be held in the Netherlands, home to almost 200 of the victims.
“With this decision, we are taking the next step on the way to uncover the truth, the prosecution of suspects and satisfying the bereaved,” Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said in a statement.