REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, DONETSK - A train carrying the remains of many of the nearly 300 victims of the Malaysia Airlines plane downed over Ukraine arrived in Ukrainian government territory on Tuesday as a separatist leader handed over the plane's black boxes to Malaysian experts.
The train carrying around 200 body bags arrived in the eastern city of Kharkiv, which is in Ukrainian government hands. The bodies will then be taken back to the Netherlands to be identified.
The train left the crash site after the Malaysian prime minister agreed with the separatists for recovered bodies to be handed over to authorities in the Netherlands, where two thirds of the victims came from.
The handover and reports by international investigators of improved access to the wreckage of the airliner four days after it was shot down, came amid calls for broader sanctions against Russia for its support for the rebellion, although Western leaders are struggling to agree on a response.
Early on Tuesday, senior separatist leader Aleksander Borodai handed over the black boxes in the city of Donetsk.
"Here they are, the black boxes," Borodai told journalists at the headquarters of his self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic as an armed rebel placed the boxes on a desk.
Colonel Mohamed Sakri of the Malaysian National Security Council said the two black boxes were "in good condition".
Shaken by the deaths of 298 people from around the world, Western governments have threatened Russia with stiffer penalties for what they say is its backing of pro-Russian militia who, their evidence suggests, shot the plane down.
At the United Nations, the Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution demanding those responsible "be held to account and that all states cooperate fully with efforts to establish accountability". It also demanded that armed groups allow "safe, secure, full and unrestricted access" to the crash site.
"We owe it to the victims and their families to determine what happened and who was responsible," said Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop. Australia lost 28 citizens in the crash.
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