First bodies begin journey home

Newspaper ads from Dutch govt honor victims of doomed flight

The first bodies from the MH17 crash in Ukraine will be flown to the Netherlands on Wednesday, Prime Minister Mark Rutte said on Tuesday.

"Tomorrow the first plane (with bodies) will leave for Eindhoven" in the southern Netherlands, Rutte told journalists after the bodies arrived in Ukraine's Kharkiv from rebel-held territory.

Dutch experts prepared on Tuesday to take custody of some 280 bodies recovered from downed Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17.

Rebels controlling the crash site released the morgue train under intense international pressure, finally allowing a great majority of the 298 crash victims to begin the long journey home.

Their remains are now to be flown to the Netherlands, which had 193 citizens on board the doomed flight and is taking the lead in investigating a disaster that has brought Ukraine's bloody three-month conflict to the doorstep of countries as far away as Australia.

Ads to commemorate the victims of the MH17 crash dominated Dutch national newspapers on Tuesday, including a full-page ad from the Dutch government.

"Shocked and saddened" read the government's ad. "With disbelief and great sadness, we learned about the crash of flight MH17," it continued, with Rutte stating that relatives would receive all possible support.

The names of the 298 victims of the crash, of which 193 were Dutch, were listed in the ad.

The House of Commons and the Senate also released an ad in the newspapers. The Senate published not only a general obituary, but also one mourning Labor Party senator Willem Witteveen, who died in the crash with his wife and daughter.

Separatists in Ukraine bowed to a furious clamor for the bodies and black boxes to be handed to investigators five days after the crash.

Both black boxes, which record cockpit activity and flight data, were handed to Malaysian officials by the prime minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, Alexander Borodai, before scores of journalists.

As world leaders denounced the "shambolic" situation at the crash site, international experts finally managed on Monday to inspect the bodies, kept in refrigerated train cars away from the sweltering summer heat, before they left for Kharkiv.

Borodai also announced a cease-fire within 10 kilometers of the impact site, hours after Kiev's authorities said they would halt all fighting in a broader zone.

The localized truce will at last allow international monitors to examine the vast area, a forensic minefield littered with poignant fragments from hundreds of destroyed lives.

Elsewhere in Ukraine's east, fighting between government forces and rebels continued unabated with local authorities in the besieged cities of Donetsk and Lugansk reporting 10 civilians killed in 24 hours.

In a sign tensions are still running high, a senior security official in Kiev claimed that Russia had massed over 40,000 soldiers along its border over the past week.

Despite the apparent progress in getting the investigation going, leaders warned the rebels' handling of the crash site had already done much damage.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, whose country had 28 citizens and nine residents on the plane, said: "There is still a long, long way to go."

AFP - Reuters - Xinhua

A train carrying the remains of victims of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 downed over rebel-held territory in eastern Ukraine arrives in the city of Kharkiv, eastern Ukraine, on Tuesday. The first bodies from the crash are expected to be flown to the Netherlands on Wednesday. Gleb Garanich / Reuters

(China Daily 07/23/2014 page12)