GRAPHIC: Malaysian passenger plane shot down over eastern Ukraine; scores dead
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AP Television
Hrabove - 17 July 2014
1. Burning wreckage of plane with people walking in the background
2. ++GRAPHIC - CONTAINS SHOT OF DEAD BODY++ Wreckage of the plane with dead body lying in the grass
GRAPHIC: Wreckage of the Malaysian plane; bodies scattered across the ground
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++GRAPHIC WARNING: THIS FOOTAGE CONTAINS PICTURES OF MANY DEAD BODIES STREWN AMONGST WRECKAGE++
AP TELEVISION
Hrabove - 17 July 2014
3. Wreckage of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 in field in Hrabove, eastern Ukraine, smoke and flames rising from pieces of plane
4. ++GRAPHIC++ Human bodies strewn amongst charred wreckage of plane as debris smokes
AP PHOTOS - No Access Canada/Broadcast use only/Strictly No Access Online or Mobile
Hrabove - 17 July 2014
5. STILL: Man in uniform gesturing while standing in debris
GRAPHIC: AP cover wreckage of the plane that was shot down over eastern Ukraine
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AP TELEVISION
Hrabove- 17 July 2014
6. Wide of debris still smoking and on fire
7. debris still smouldering and on fire in places
Flowers and messages left at Schiphol Airport for passengers for downed plane
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AP TELEVISION
Schiphol Airport - 20 July 2014
8. Zoom in to woman laying flowers
Crane lifts sections of plane wreckage as serach of crash site continues
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AP TELEVISION
Hrabove - 21 July 2014
9. A crane lifting pieces of plane wreckage
Train departs carrying bodies of crash victims in refrigerated carriages
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AP TELEVISION
Torez - 21 July 2014
10. A pile of luggage on the station platform
11. The train pulling away from the station
Separatist leader hands over black boxes to Malaysia officials
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AP TELEVISION
Donetsk - 22 July 2014
12. Mid of Malaysian official inspecting first black box and placing it in a bag
13. Close of black boxes, pull out to Sakri and rebel official shaking hands
Scuffles break out in parliament as MPs discuss Malaysian plane crash; minute of silence
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AP TELEVISION
Kiev - 22 July 2014
14. Various of lawmakers pushing each other
OSCE mission inspects another site scattered with debris from plane crash
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AP TELEVISION
Petropavlivka - 23 July 2014
15. Wide of OSCE Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) inspectors
convoy at side of field
Planes carrying 38 MH17 coffins arrive to the Netherlands in a solemn ceremony
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AP TELEVISION
Eindhoven - 26 July 2014
16. Various of military carrying a coffin
An Associated Press journalist has counted at least 22 bodies at the wreckage site of a passenger plane that was shot down on July 17th 2014 as it flew over the country.
Both the government and the pro-Russia separatists fighting in the region denied any responsibility for downing the plane.
The plane appeared to have broken up before impact and the burning wreckage - which included body parts and the belongings of passengers - was scattered over a wide area.
***
Dead bodies of passengers were visible amongst the smouldering wreckage of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 on July 17th after the plane was shot down over eastern Ukraine.
Both the Ukrainian government and the pro-Russia separatists fighting in the region denied any responsibility for downing the aircraft, which was carrying 295 people.
As plumes of black smoke rose up near a rebel-held village of Hrabove, an Associated Press journalist counted at least 22 bodies at the wreckage site 40 kilometres (25 miles) from the Russian border.
The Boeing 777-200ER plane, travelling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, appeared to have broken up before impact and the burning wreckage, which included body parts and the belongings of passengers, was scattered over a wide area.
Men in army fatigues, believed to be pro-Russia separatists, were seen at the crash site.
***
A Malaysia Airlines passenger plane carrying 295 people was shot down over eastern Ukraine on July 17th, Ukrainian officials said.
The Boeing 777-200ER plane, travelling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, appeared to have broken up before impact and the burning wreckage, which included body parts and the belongings of passengers, was scattered over a wide area.
Both the government and the pro-Russia separatists fighting in the region denied any responsibility for downing the aircraft.
The village is under the control of pro-Russia separatists and the area has seen severe fighting between the two sides in recent days.
A Russian news report said pro-Russia rebels intend to call a three-day cease-fire to allow for an investigation into the crash and recovery efforts.
***
Flowers were laid outside Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands on July 20th to commemorate the victims of the downed flight MH17.
KLM (Royal Dutch Airlines) flight attendants and members of the public also left messages in a book of condolences just outside the airport.
Airline employees are starting to wonder how safe it is to fly over crisis zones.
"We always assume that everything is safe but apparently it is not, so that is another reason to be wondering what happened here," said Boris Tester, a purser for KLM.
The Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said Saturday he had an "extremely intense" telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, during which he urged him to use his influence over separatist rebels in Ukraine to ensure they do not hinder efforts to investigate the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.
The plane crashed on July 17th, killing all 298 passengers and crew, most of them Dutch citizens.
***
A crane at the crash scene moved big chunks of the Boeing 777 on Monday while emergency workers retrieved more bodies in the sprawling fields of eastern Ukraine where Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was downed, killing all 298 people aboard.
By early July 21st, local emergency workers had piled at least 21 black body bags by the side of the road in Hrabove.
That brought the total found to 272 of the 298 passengers and crew killed in the tragedy, according to Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk.
The bodies were being sent to the refrigerated railcars in the nearby town of Torez, where the other bodies are being kept.
A train engineer told The Associated Press that the cars' refrigeration had been off overnight and it was not immediately clear why. The cooling system was back up and running early July 21st, he said.
The shambolic attempts to investigate by the pro-Russia separatists who control the verdant farmland where pieces of the plane crashed have fanned widespread international outrage, especially from the nations whose citizens were on the doomed plane.
Four days after the jetliner was shot out of the sky, international investigators still had only limited access to the crash site in eastern Ukraine.
The the UN Security Council is expected to vote today on an Australia-proposed resolution demanding international access to the crash site and a cease-fire around the area.
***
A refrigerated train bearing the bodies of many of the 298 people killed in the Malaysia Airlines plane disaster pulled away on July 21st from a rebel-held town in eastern Ukraine.
The train left from Torez, 15 kilometres (9 miles) from the crash site.
An Associated Press reporter overheard armed separatists saying it was heading for the rebel-held town of Ilovaysk.
There was no official confirmation of that destination from the rebels.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said that the remains of 282 of the crash victims are being moved by train to Kharkiv, where they will be handed over to Dutch authorities.
From there, he said, they will be flown to Amsterdam on a Dutch C130 Hercules military plane and handed over to Dutch authorities.
Razak said the leader of the pro-Russian rebels has agreed to hand over both black boxes from Flight 17 to Malaysian investigators who are in Ukraine.
***
A Ukrainian separatist leader handed over black boxes from flight MH17 to Malaysia officials in Donetsk early on July 22nd.
Alexander Borodai, Prime Minister of self-proclaimed People's Republic of Donetsk said they were "being returned to their owners."
A Malaysian investigator said the boxes were in good condition.
Flight MH17 was shot down in the rebel-controlled area of eastern Ukraine, killing all 298 people onboard.
Experts have called for a full forensic sweep of the crash site amid suggestions that some of the evidence may have been tampered with.
***
Scuffles broke out in the Ukrainian parliament on July 22nd after a lawmaker blamed the Ukrainian authorities for failing to adopt a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine and accused them of running a war against the Ukrainian people.
The accusations were made by lawmaker Mykola Levchenko from the Party of Regions, which was close to Ukraine's former president Viktor Yanukovych.
Lawmaker Ihor Miroshychenko from the Svoboda Party started to push Levchenko, before other lawmakers joined in the fight.
The incident took place as parliament discussed Malaysian airlines flight MH17, which crashed in eastern Ukraine the previous week.
The parliamentary session started with a minute of silence to remember the victims.
Oleksandr Turchynov, the Chairman of the Ukrainian Parliament, accused Russia of committing "acts of military aggression against Ukraine" by providing weapons to separatist fighters in eastern Ukraine and sending troops to the border.
"Russia is continuing an escalation of armed opposition in these (Donetsk and Luhansk) regions," said Andriy Parubiy, the Secretary of Ukraine's National Security and Defence Council.
"Right now, around 41-thousand Russian Federation armed forces servicemen are located on the eastern and northern Ukrainian borders and Crimea's borders," he added.
Fighting in eastern Ukraine began in mid-April after Russia annexed Ukraine's southern Crimean Peninsula a month earlier.
***
Monitors from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on July 23rd visited a different site peppered with wreckage of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.
The pro-Russian separatists who are in control of the main crash area are showing little willingness to allow the full-scale investigation that's being demanded by world leaders.
The debris is still unguarded across a wide stretch of farmland.
International observers say there are signs that the debris is being mishandled or even tampered with.
So far, though, there still has not been a full-scale investigation of the site.
Ukrainian aviation officials were allowed to visit briefly on July 18th but got little access.
Forensic officials from the Netherlands were allowed a visit on July 21st.
***
Two military cargo planes, one Dutch and the other Australian, also flew 38 more coffins carrying victims to the Netherlands for identification and investigation.
The planes took off on July 26th from Kharkiv, a government-controlled city where the bodies have been brought from the wreckage site in territory held by pro-Russian separatists fighting the Ukrainian government.
They landed later in the afternoon in Eindhoven, where the coffins were transferred to a fleet of hearses in a solemn ceremony.
Officials said the flights took the last of the 227 coffins containing victims that had been brought to Kharkiv by refrigerated train.
Officials say the exact number of people held in the coffins is still to be determined by forensic experts in the Netherlands.
International observers have said there are still remains at the crash site. Access has been limited due to rebel interference and security concerns.
The Boeing 777 went down July 17 as it headed to Kuala Lumpur from Amsterdam, killing all 298 people on board. Most of them were Dutch citizens.
