REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, VIENNA -- The OSCE, which has been monitoring the security situation in eastern Ukraine, has called a crisis meeting Friday to discuss the Malaysia Airlines crash.

"A special Permanent Council meeting is taking place... today at 12:30 pm Vienna time (1030 GMT) on the tragic crash of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 in eastern Ukraine," the organisation said in a statement.

The Vienna-based security body has had teams of monitors in Ukraine for months, and has been trying to mediate talks between Moscow and Kiev as well as local separatist groups in Ukraine's restive east to put an end to the unrest there.

In a statement earlier Friday, the so-called trilateral Contact Group on the Ukraine Crisis said separatist groups had agreed to provide "safe access and security guarantees" to national and international investigators in the area under their control, following Thursday's crash.

This included safe access to the site for OSCE monitors, with the separatists also saying they would close off the area of the crash and allow local authorities to recover the bodies of the victims.

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