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MH17 plane crash: Train with bodies leaves Ukraine station | MH17 plane crash: Train with bodies leaves Ukraine station |
(35 minutes later) | |
A Ukrainian train carrying bodies from the Malaysia Airlines plane crash has left the station of the town of Torez. | A Ukrainian train carrying bodies from the Malaysia Airlines plane crash has left the station of the town of Torez. |
Pro-Russian rebels controlling the crash site have agreed for the remains to be taken to the city of Kharkiv to be later flown to the Netherlands. | Pro-Russian rebels controlling the crash site have agreed for the remains to be taken to the city of Kharkiv to be later flown to the Netherlands. |
Western countries say flight MH17 was shot down on 17 July by the rebels, killing all 298 people on board. | Western countries say flight MH17 was shot down on 17 July by the rebels, killing all 298 people on board. |
Meanwhile the rebels have been involved in heavy fighting in Donetsk, the main city left under their control. | |
The clashes - involving heavy weapons - are continuing near the city's airport and the railway station, eyewitnesses say. | |
At the scene: The BBC's Fergal Keane in Donetsk | |
For three hours close to the railway station I watched as several hundred civilians fled past. | |
There was shelling throughout the morning, some from Grad rockets but also mortar fire and intermittent sniper shots. | |
Most of this seemed to be coming from the direction of villages on the road between the airport and the railway station. | |
It was impossible to be sure who was firing or in which direction. However we saw the aftermath of a rocket strike in the playground of an apartment complex close to the station - a rebel controlled area. | |
Next to the crater lay a pool of blood, a man's shoes and a pair of glasses. | |
Donetsk clashes hamper MH17 work | |
At least three civilians were reported killed, and one multi-storey building was seen on fire. Residents are fleeing, according to BBC correspondents in the area. | |
The fighting in eastern Ukraine erupted in April and is believed to have claimed more than 1,000 lives. | |
'Safe access' | |
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak announced he had received assurances from Alexander Borodai, the leader of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, that the remains of 282 passengers would be moved by train to Kharkiv and handed over to international investigators. | |
Mr Najib did not clarify what would happen with the remaining bodies. | |
He said the rebels had also agreed to hand over two "black-box" flight-data recorders recovered from the crash site to a Malaysian team, and that independent international experts would "be guaranteed safe access" to the site to begin their probe. | |
The train's departure comes after tough negotiations between Western nations and the separatists, who had been accused of hampering access to the crash site. | |
Earlier on Monday, three Dutch experts became the first international investigators to examine the bodies of the victims in the carriages in Torez, some 15km away from the crash site. | |
The team said the storage of the bodies had been "of good quality". | |
The investigators also later visited the area where the Boeing 777 went down after being reportedly hit by a missile. | |
Monitors from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe have been at the accident site, but their access to the wreckage was limited by the rebels. | |
There has been international outcry over the way rebels have handled the situation, leaving passengers' remains exposed to summer heat and allowing untrained volunteers to comb through the area. | |
President Barack Obama earlier accused the rebels of tampering with potential evidence and called for the international experts to be granted "immediate and full" access to the site. | |
He also warned that Russia would "only further isolate itself" if it failed to compel the separatists to co-operate. | |
British Prime Minister David Cameron said there was strong evidence that pro-Russian separatists shot down the plane with an anti-aircraft system known as Buk. | |
Russia on Monday again denied allegations that it had supplied such missiles or "any other weapons" to the rebels. |