On July 21, the U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted an Australian-sponsored resolution condemning "in the strongest terms," the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 on 17 July near Donetsk, Ukraine, killing all 298 passengers and crew. Resolution 2166 called for "a full, thorough and independent international investigation" into the incident and demanded those responsible be held to account.

Australia took the lead in the tough resolution because 37 Australian citizens and residents were among the dead. The strongly worded resolution was adopted so swiftly because the world was united in grief and outrage at the tragedy. We have a right to expect that a commercial flight in an approved air corridor will not be shot down. As this is not the first such incident, the response needs to move beyond one resolution to a set of protocols and agreements to govern any future repeat.

On Sept. 1, 1983, the Soviet Union shot down Korean Air Flight 007 near Sakhalin, killing 269 people, mistaking it for a U.S. military spy plane that had ignored warning signals to enter sensitive Soviet airspace. On July 3, 1988, the U.S. warship Vincennes shot down Iran Air flight 655 flying within its approved flight path with a surface-to-air missile (SAM), killing 290 people. On Oct. 4, 2001, Ukraine's military shot down a Russian passenger jet returning from Israel over the Black Sea, killing 78.