Yahoo – AFP,
Dario Thuburn with Oleksandr Savochenko and Hui Min Neo in Kiev, 26 July 2014
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A man
stands at the crash site of the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 on July 26,
2014,
near the village of Hrabove (Grabove), in the Donetsk region (AFP Photo/
Bulent
Kilic)
|
A man
stands at the crash site of the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 on July 26, 2014,
near the village of Hrabove (Grabove), in the Donetsk region
Grabove
(Ukraine) (AFP) - The first relatives of victims on the ill-fated Malaysia
Airlines flight MH17 arrived on Saturday at the crash site, as Dutch and
Australian forces prepared for possible deployment to secure the location in
rebel-held east Ukraine.
A truce has
been called in the immediate area around the site by both the Kiev forces and
pro-Russian separatists, but combat was raging just 60 kilometres (35 miles)
away, with loud explosions heard at regular intervals in western and northern
suburbs of rebel stronghold Donetsk.
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Jerzy
Dyczynsk (R) and Angela Rudhart-
Dyczynski from Australia react as they
arrive
on July 26, 2014 at the crash site of
the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 to look
for their late daughter Fatima, near the
village of Hrabove (Grabovo) (AFP
Photo/
Bulent Kilic)
|
"She
was full of life," said Angela Rudhart-Dyczynski of their 25-year-old
daughter Fatima, an aerospace engineering student who died when the
Amsterdam-to-Kuala Lumpur plane was shot down July 17, killing all 298 people
on board.
She and her
husband Jerzy Dyczynski, who wore a T-shirt with the words "Fatima: We
Love You" were overcome with emotion as they walked among the wreckage and
scorched earth, and laid a large bouquet of flowers on part of the debris.
The Dutch
government, which is in charge of identifying the remains found at the site, said
that forensic experts had confirmed the identity the first victim on Saturday,
one of 193 Dutch citizens who had been on board.
An
investigation into the downing of flight MH17 has been hampered by the violence
plaguing east Ukraine, which claimed at least nine lives in the last 24 hours
in insurgent holdout Lugansk.
Dutch
experts sought to travel to the site on Saturday but turned back because of
safety concerns.
'Humanitarian mission'
The rebels
who are accused of shooting down the plane with a missile from Russia have
signalled they are only open to allowing a small group of Australian and Dutch
officers in.
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Soldiers
carry coffins with the remains of
the victims of the MH17 plane crash at
Eindhoven military airport July 26, 2014
(AFP Photo/Vincent Jannink)
|
"It's
the presence of unrecovered remains that makes it more important than ever that
an international team be dispatched," he said.
"Others
can get involved if they wish in the politics of eastern Europe. Our sole
concern is to claim our dead and to bring them home."
Abbott
later on Saturday discussed plans with Russian President Vladimir Putin for
"an independent and objective international inquiry," the Kremlin
said in a statement.
After a few
days when little activity was seen, recovery efforts appeared to restart again
on Saturday, AFP reporters at the scene said.
The mission
may not be imminent in any case as Ukraine's parliament, which needs to
formally approve any international deployment, is only due to broach the issue
at a session on Thursday.
The
Netherlands is planning to send 60 officers and said troops had been consigned
to barracks and had leave cancelled ahead of the planned mission.
Australia
is sending 190 police along with a small number of its defence forces to the
Netherlands in view of the mission.
'Second
front'
 |
This photo
taken on July 26, 2014 shows
flowers, left by parents of an Australian
victim
of the crash, laid on a piece of the
Malaysia Airlines plane MH17, near the
village of Hrabove (Grabovo), in the
Donetsk region (AFP Photo/Bulent Kilic)
|
Moscow
angrily blasted the move as "irresponsible" and warned it put at risk
cooperation on security issues.
Ukraine's
army meanwhile pressed its offensive to wrest back control of the vital
industrial east, with volleys of what appeared to be Grad rocket fire heard all
through Saturday.
"We
can't sleep at night! There's no electricity, no water, no gas. The houses are
burning," said Viktoriya Konovalova, 32, who sat selling apricots by the
side of the road in the Oktyabrsky suburb of Donetsk as the booming echoed
behind her.
While the
fighting raged, politicians in Kiev were battling to limit the fallout from
Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk's abrupt resignation on Thursday.
Lawmakers
are to meet next week to discuss the prime minister's future. President Petro
Poroshenko has insisted on Yatsenyuk's cooperation until new elections are
held.
The premier
quit in fury after several parties walked out of his ruling coalition in what
appeared to be the beginning of a rancorous campaign ahead of parliamentary
elections this fall.
 |
Members of
the Ukrainian State Emergency Service search for bodies in a
field near the
crash site of the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 near the village
of Hrabove
(Grabovo), in Donetsk region on July 26, 2014 (AFP Photo/Bulent Kilic)
|
The
Fatherland faction of ex-prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko condemned the
coalition's collapse, saying it "opens up a second front" as the
country battles to quell the eastern insurgency.
In a sign
the upheaval in the cash-strapped country is ringing alarm bells, International
Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde rang Poroshenko to remind him of reforms
Kiev had pledged to undertake in exchange for its $17-billion two-year
financial lifeline.
The IMF had
previously forecast that Ukraine's economy would contract by 6.5 percent this
year.
The other
chief protagonist in the Ukraine conflict -- Russia -- is also widely expected
to sink into recession.
Related Article:
 |
Jerzy
Dyczynsk and Angela Rudhart-Dyczynski from Australia, whose daughter
Fatima,
25, died on flight MH17, on Saturday visited the crash site in disputed
eastern
Ukraine. Photograph: Bulent Kilic/AFP/Getty Images
|
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