Grabove, Ukraine: International monitors said on Sunday that pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine had loaded scores of bodies from the crash site of downed Malaysian jet MH17 into train wagons as grieving families clamoured to have their loved ones brought home.
Observers from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) found the corpses packed into a series of refrigerated train wagons at a station in the town of Torez, some 15 kilometres (nine miles) from the crash site.
Spokesman Michael Bociurkiw described the stench at the station as “almost unbearable” and said separatists guarding the grisly cargo had pledged not to move the bodies until “international experts” arrive.
Top rebel leader Alexander Borodai told Russia’s Echo of Moscow radio the fighters had loaded 196 bodies on to the trains.
What happens to the remains of the 298 people has become of primary concern after they lay for days rotting in cornfields.
As Ukraine accused separatist rebels of hiding evidence relating to Thursday’s downing of the airliner over eastern Ukraine with the loss of 298 lives, a pro-Russian separatist leader said items thought to be the stricken Boeing 777’s “black boxes” were now in rebel hands.
