Outrage over handling of Malaysian jet bodies
HRABOVE, Ukraine — International monitors moved gingerly Saturday through fields reeking of the decomposing corpses that fell from a Malaysian airliner shot down over rebel-held eastern Ukraine, trying to secure the sprawling site in hopes that a credible investigation can be conducted. The government in Kiev said militiamen had removed 38 bodies from the crash site near the Russian border and taken them to the rebel-held city of Donetsk. The rebels are also “seeking large transports to carry away plane fragments to Russia,” the Ukrainian government said Saturday. In Donetsk, separatist leader Alexander Borodai denied any bodies had been transferred or that the rebels had interfered with the work of observers. The Boeing 777 flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur carried 298 people from 13 countries. More than half of them were Dutch. An angry Dutch prime minister told reporters Saturday that he was “shocked by images of completely disrespectful behavior” of rebels picking through the wreckage and personal belongings of victims at the crash scene. Mark Rutte said he had an “extremely intense” telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin in which he urged Putin to “show the world he intends to help” in the investigation. The location of the black boxes remains a mystery, and the separatist leadership insisted Saturday that it had not located them.
Grim task in the Netherlands
In the Netherlands, forensic teams fanned out across the country Saturday to collect material, including DNA samples from victims’ relatives, which will help identify the remains of the 192 Dutch passengers.
Singapore Airlines apologizes
Singapore Airlines apologized Saturday over postings on Facebook and Twitter that claimed that its flights do not fly across Ukrainian airspace. The remarks drew the ire of many Malaysians, with some taking to social media themselves.