The bodies of 196 MH17 crash victims have been placed inside refrigerated train carriages, according to the leadership of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, who also wonders why international experts are still not at the crash scene.
World mourns MH17 crash victims as body recovery continues
At least three refrigerated train carriages with bodies of those killed in the MH17 plane crash have departed from the town of Torez, near the site of the crash, to the town of Ilovaysk and are on their way to Donetsk.
Alternative reports suggest the train is still in Torez and the decision on where it will go depends on what authorities in Kiev say.
"So far, I do not know where they plan to take them," Sergey Kavtaradze, an official representative of the prime minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) told the Russian News Service.
The carriages at the Torez station were reportedly examined by the OSCE observers, who said there were 196 bodies inside.
That has not been confirmed by Alexander Hug, deputy chief monitor of the OSCE special monitoring mission to Ukraine, who said his team had actually seen body bags in the train carriages but were unable to count them, Reuters reports.
The bodies were lying in the heat for several days and have begun to decompose. By now special equipment is needed to deal with them.
The leadership of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) has been accusing the international community of taking too much time to send international experts to the crash site.
“We’ve been inviting them for three days, but so far no one
has come except for four experts from Ukraine,” Kavtaradze
told RT on Sunday.
A day earlier DPR’s PM, Aleksandr Boroday, accused the
international community of lacking enthusiasm to investigate the
plane crash.
“Several dozen experts are currently in Kiev,” he said.
“Can they please come here faster? We are surprised and
frankly angered that we have to keep the area untouched while we
are waiting for them for so long.”
These are the train drivers. They told me they have no idea where they will be driving the train with MH17 bodies pic.twitter.com/nqCPN3virk
— Shaun Walker (@shaunwalker7) July 20, 2014
Investigators from the UN aviation agency, ICAO, have arrived in
Ukraine to help probe the crash, but cannot reach the site
because of safety concerns, a senior agency source told Reuters
on Sunday. The two investigators who were in the country could
not reach the site of the tragedy or examine the plane's flight
recorders, according to an unnamed official.
“Nobody has been allowed to have access to the site for that
purpose,” the source is cited as saying. “Until safe
passage for them is assured we don't send people into that kind
of situation.”
The international community has been accusing the anti-Kiev forces on the ground of mishandling bodies and evidence at the crash site.
The Dutch foreign minister said his country was
"furious" to hear bodies were being "dragged
around." Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott described the
crash site in the territory controlled by anti-Kiev forces as
"absolutely chaotic."
Boroday explained all of the actions undertaken at the site of
the crash were dictated by urgent humanitarian need to take care
of the decomposing bodies.
The government of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic
(DPR) once again said it was waiting for the international
experts to come and said it guaranteed their security, but wanted
the Kiev authorities to agree to a ceasefire in turn, according
to statement by DPR’s deputy PM, Andrey Purgin.
"We declare that we guarantee security of international
experts at the site of the tragedy if Kiev agrees to a
ceasefire,” the statement reads as cited by RIA Novosti.
“We call on Kiev to immediately sign this agreement with DPR
at least for the period of time while experts are going to work
at the site of the plane crash.”
Meanwhile, foreign journalists managed to get to a station where
a train with the dead bodies stood. Their tweets from the site
made many internet users wonder why journalists were able to make
it to the crash scene, but experts could not.
@shaunwalker7#MH17 Funny that journalists will be there. Where are the #Dutch investigators? Filling out forms/reading safety instructions?
— emile weekers (@EWeekers) July 20, 2014