HRABOVE, Ukraine (AP) — Dutch forensic investigators told the armed separatists guarding train cars full
of bodies from the downed Malaysia Airlines jet that the train must be allowed to leave within hours.

The experts from the Dutch National Forensic Investigations Team — which specializes in victim recovery
and identification — also pressed for the train cars parked near the rebel-held town of Torez to be
sealed. AP journalists at the site said the smell of decay was overwhelming.
Then the experts headed for the crash site itself, 15 kilometers (9 miles) away, accompanied by monitors
from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
Of the victims, 192 were Dutch and another was Dutch-American.
The shambolic attempts to investigate by the pro-Russia separatists who control the verdant farmland
where pieces of the plane crashed to Earth have fanned widespread international outrage, especially from
the nations whose citizens were on the doomed plane. Four days after the jetliner was shot out of the
sky, international investigators still had only limited access to the crash site in eastern Ukraine.
Emergency workers piled 21 more black body bags from the blackened crash site by the side of the road
Monday in Hrabove. That brought the total found to 272 of the 298 passengers and crew killed in the
tragedy, according Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk.
The bodies were being sent to the refrigerated railcars in the nearby town of Torez, where the other
bodies are being kept. But a train engineer told The Associated Press that the cars’ refrigeration had
been off overnight and it was not immediately clear why. The cooling system was back up and running
early Monday, he said.
The smell of decomposing bodies was much more pronounced Monday at the Torez train station than a day
earlier, when 196 bodies were put into the train cars. Four rebels armed with automatic weapons were
standing guard around the cars.
Ukrainian officials say the plane was shot down by a mobile missile battery from a rebel-controlled area
in eastern Ukraine. They said the BUK rocket launcher was supplied from Russia and operated by Russian
personnel.
The United States presented what it called “powerful” evidence Sunday that the rebels shot down the
Boeing 777 with a Russian surface-to-air missile. That evidence included video of a rocket launcher, one
surface-to-air missile missing, leaving the likely launch site; imagery showing the firing; phone calls
claiming credit for the strike and phone recordings said to reveal a cover-up at the crash site.
“A buildup of extraordinary circumstantial evidence … it’s powerful here,” said U.S. Secretary of State
John Kerry.
“Russia is supporting these separatists. Russia is arming these separatists. Russia is training these
separatists,” he added.
Fighting flared again Monday between the separatists and government troops in the eastern rebel-held city
of Donetsk. City authorities said battles were taking place near the town’s airport and warned residents
to stay inside. An AP reporter heard several explosions and saw smoke rising from the direction of the
airport.
Pressure has been growing on Russian President Vladimir Putin, who the U.S. and others say has backed and
armed the rebels, to rein in the insurgents in Ukraine and allow a full-scale investigation. Russia has
denied backing the separatists.
Putin lashed out against those criticisms again Monday, accusing others of exploiting the downing of the
plane for “mercenary objectives.”
Putin said Russia was doing everything possible to allow a team of experts from the International Civil
Aviation Organization, a U.N. agency, to investigate the scene. He again criticized the Ukraine
government authorities in Kiev for reigniting the fighting with the pro-Russia rebels who control the
crash site.
“We can say with confidence that if fighting in eastern Ukraine had not been renewed on June 28, this
tragedy would not have happened,” Putin said. “Nobody should or does have a right to use this tragedy
for such mercenary objectives.”
Yatsenyuk, Ukraine’s prime minister, angrily called on Russia to halt what he said was its support for
the rebels.
“They have to stop, and President Putin has to realize, enough is enough,” he said. “What we expect from
Russia: To de-escalate the situation, to withdraw their agents, to close the border, to stop their
support for these bastards, and to stick to international law and international observations.”
A team of international monitors, including three from the Dutch National Forensic Investigations Team,
were to visit both Torez and the crash site later Monday.
Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, whose country lost 192 citizens on the plane, told a news conference
that repatriating the bodies was his “No. 1 priority.”
Rebel leader Alexander Borodai denied his fighters were trying to tamper with evidence at the site,
saying the bodies would be turned over to a team of Malaysian experts. A group of investigators that
included Malaysian officials was in Kiev, but said they wouldn’t go into rebel-held areas until they get
better assurances about security.
Despite Borodai’s claims, it was clear that the rebels were interfering in the investigation.
Lyubov Kudryavets, a worker at the Torez morgue, said the evening the plane went down, a resident brought
in the bloodied body of a young child. On Saturday, militiamen came to take away the body away, she
said.
“They began to question me: ‘Where are the fragments of rocket? Where are the fragments from the plane?”’
Kudryavets said. “But I didn’t have any wreckage. … I swear.”
Experts said even if investigators were granted access now to the site, it might be too late.
“Even without any deliberate attempt at a cover-up, the crash site is already compromised in forensic
terms,” said Keir Giles, an associate fellow at the Chatham House think tank.
He said a reconstruction of the aircraft fuselage and wings would show how the missile struck the plane
and what type it was.
“If any aircraft parts have already been removed … this compromises the objectivity of the
investigation,” he said.
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AP staff writer Laura Mills reported from Moscow and AP staff writer David McHugh contributed from Kiev.

AP staff writer Laura Mills reported from Moscow and AP staff writer David McHugh contributed from Kiev.