Day 3 of MH17 tragedy

Latest developments:

• Kuala Lumpur MH17 media centre closes

KL MH17 media centre closes

11.22pm: The MH17 media centre at Sama-Sama Hotel is now closed as press conferences will now be held at Kiev.

Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin attends a tahlil (prayer) session for the victims of the crash in Putrajaya along with NGOs.

Ukraine says it agreed to removing remains

9.43pm : Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe's (OSCE) special monitoring mission (SMM) says that it counted only 167 bodies on the refridgerated trains when it inspected them under the watch of armed gunmen.

OSCE SMM spokesperson Michael Bociurkiw said that the bodies will eventually be sent to Ukraine goverment-held areas.

German news agency DPA meanwhile reports that Kiev and the pro-Russia separatists agreed to move the bodies from the crash site.

Ukranian Deputy Prime Minister Vladimir Groisman confirmed the remains will be stored in the refrigerated railway coaches and will be taken to a laboratory in Kharkiv.

Separatist leader Alexander Borodai, however, told Associated Press that the bodies will go nowhere until 12 Malaysian experts arrive.

Borodai also says that the the separatists will hand over the black box they found to the International Civil Aviation Organisation.

Kiev: Separatists take away bodies

7.14pm: Separatists have forced rescue workers to hand over 196 bodies found, and have taken them to cities held by the pro-Russia group.

Associated Press quoted Ukranian officials as saying that the bodies were loaded into refrigerated trains.

The news agency says its reporters saw decomposing bodies piled up on Saturday and that the bodies were gone when they checked today.

"The SMM spokesperson does not know who these people are," the Ukraine Crisis Media Centre said, after a phone call conversation with the spokesperson for Ukraine, Michael Bociurkiw. 

6.15pm: Gerakan Youth national bureau chief has lodged police report against Yuki Tan, who is the spouse of Tanjung MP Ng Wei Aik.

The bureau chief Puspanathan Jayaveloo claimed that Tan's remarks regarding the recent MH17 tragic disaster was "extreme".

He was upset that Tan (right) had blamed Malaysia for the tragedy, which claimed the lives of 298 passengers including 15 crew members on Thursday night.

Puspanathan accused Tan of disparaging the reputation of Malaysia in her Facebook post on the day the Malaysian Airline was shot down in the Ukraine-Russia border.

"I asked my Chinese speaking friend what Tan wrote in her Facebook posting (as it was in Mandarin) and he said, Tan remarked that Malaysia was scary, what kind of useless country this is," Puspanathan said as he lodged the report.

Tan has earlier apologized and took down the posting, saying she never meant to blame the country for the downing of the Malaysian flight.

UN Security Council mulls resolution on MH17

5.45pm The United National Security Council is mulling a resolution to condemn the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, demand armed groups allow access to the crash site and call on states in the region to cooperate with an international investigation, according to Australia-based ABC News.

Read full story here .

Health minister  S Subramaniam slams Russia and Ukraine

4.54pm: Despite Putrajaya's diplomatic replies on cooperation it is receiving from Ukraine and Russia, Health Minister S Subramaniam has slammed both countries for being less than helpful to Malaysia.

"I am angry that our Smart (Special Malaysian Disaster Assistance and Rescue Team) is not getting the necessary support and access to the crash site in recovery operations.

"Ukranian and Russian authorities owe it to us to provide support for our safe participation," he said in a statement on Facebook.

Read full story here .

196 bodies recored thus far

4.32pm:  Ukraine's State Emergency Service says it has recovered 196 bodies from the crash site, according to CNN .

A total of 380 people are scouring an area of 34 square kilometres at the crash site to find the bodies but unidentified men were also seen retrieving bodies without authorisation.

Michael Bociurkiw, a spokesman for observers from of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, was quoted as saying that unidentified men were seen moving an unknown number of body bags.

It is hard to get reliable information because several groups of pro-Russian rebels, some of them masked, control the area, Bociurkiw was quoted as saying.

There were a total of 298 passengers and crew on board Flight MH17.

MAS to retire flight number MH17

4pm : Malaysia Airlines (MAS) has announced that it will retire the flight number MH17 out of respect for the crew and passengers of the ill-fated flight which was crashed in Eastern Ukraine on July 17 after being hit by a missile.

In a statement, MAS' announced that the flight number MH19 will replace MH17 to service the Amsterdam-Kuala Lumpur route.

"There are no changes to the frequency of our services and we will continue to operate daily services between Amsterdam and Kuala Lumpur," it said.

"Our thoughts and prayers remains with the families of our colleagues and passengers of MH 17," it added.

The changes will take effect on July 25.

Guan Eng: M'sia must engage Russia as well as Ukraine

3.45pm: Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng wants Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin and Defence Minister Hishammuddin Hussein to set out for Russia to urge Moscow to assist in the MH17 incident.

Lim says Malaysia cannot only engage Ukraine alone, as Russia has influence over the separatists in Ukraine which is in control of the region where the plane wreckage lies.

"We need to talk to two countries and Russia is more important as it has influence over the region," he says.

Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai is already in Ukraine to oversee Malaysia's role in the investigation process.

Ukraine gets non-Nato ally status

2.44pm: The Ukrainian Crisis Media Center (UCMC), the Ukraine government's official press centre, says US has granted the country a non-Nato ally status.

The status is provided to Ukraine together with Moldova as well as Georgia, which was in 2008 also invaded by Russia, under the Russian Aggression Prevention Act (RAPA) of 2014 which was approved by the US Congress on Thursday.

"The legislation authorises the transfer of military assistance to Ukraine, including the anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons and small arms, based on the needs and the assessment of capabilities of Ukrainian Armed Forces," it says.

2:40 The Malaysian Crisis Intervention Team (MCIT) has clarified that the next of kin suffering from emotional breakdowns reported earlier are those who are overseas.

"The families in question are not the ones in Malaysia, but those in Amsterdam," said MCIT deputy chairperson Abdul Jalil Hassan.

"Maybe they are not getting support like the families here in Malaysia," he said, adding that MCIT will extend their counselling services to those in the Netherlands as well.

The families in Malaysian, he said, are mostly stable, and have come to terms with their loss.

He said it was easier for them to accept what had happened, as their loss was not ambigious as was the case for the next of kin of those on board MAS flight MH370 that went missing in March.

He was speaking to reporters at the MCIT operations room in Putrajaya Marriott Hotel.

On support for families who have chosen to stay at home, he said preparations are being made for counsellors to pay them a visit.

DAP calls gov't to set up international legal team

1.30pm: Puchong MP Gobind Deo Singh urges the government to set up an international legal team over the MH17 incident.

"Malaysia cannot sit back and wait in moments like these. We must take steps to safeguard our interests and that of the victims of this tragedy.

"As such, I call upon the prime minister and the attorney-general to seriously consider roping in a team of lawyers and experts both from Malaysia and abroad who are familiar with the international legal provisions which are applicable to assist without any delay," he says.

Ukraine gov't says still no sign of black box

12.30pm: The Ukranian authorities have stressed that they are yet to receive any black boxes supposedly retrieved from the crash site of MH17.

In a statement issued last night, the Ukraine government said the location of the black boxes remains unclear, amidst conflicting reports that they have been sent to either Russia or handed over to the Ukranian authorities.

"The Ukranian side has not been given access to any of the black boxes that were in the plane," the statement, issued by the Ukranian embassy to Malaysia, said.

Tragedy brings English football rivals together

12.15pm: In a rare show of solidarity, fans of English football club Sunderland have started a fundraising campaign for the two Newcastle United fans who died in the MH17 crash.

Newcastle and Sunderland are long regarded to have one of the most bitter rivalries in English football, as they hail from the same northeast region in the United Kingdom.

Sky Sports reports that Sunderland fans have raised more than 14,000 pounds for the two deceased, Liam Sweeney, 28, and John Adler, 63.

The fund was initially set up for a floral tribute, but continues to attract donations until now.

Both Sweeney and Adler were reportedly on their way to New Zealand to watch their team play in a pre-season tour there.

Next of kin feeling emotional strain

11.50: Women, Family and Community Development Minister Rohani Karim says the next of kin of those on board flight MH17 are being emotionally taxed.

"As we enter the third day, some families have started to break down (emotionally), their grief has intensified," she told reporters.

Rohani was speaking at the Marriott Hotel in Putrajaya after meeting with three families, including that of Najib Abdul Razak's step grandmother Siti Amirah.

10 families are currently staying at the hotel, where 17 rooms have been reserved for them.

There is also a 24-hour operations room here, where 20 counsellors have been stationed to provide emotional support to the next of kin since June 18.

Dutch banks pre-empt MH17 credit card fraud

10.30am: Dutch banks are now taking "preventive" measures to ensure nobody abuses the credit cards of the victims who have perishes in MH17, after reports that some credit cards had been looted by locals near where the plane had crashed.

AFP reports that the Dutch banks have offered a refund to the relatives of victims, should they suffer losses due to any individuals using the stolen credit cards.

They had been widespread reports alleging looting had taken place at the site of the crash near the Russian border, which is being controlled by pro-Russian separatists.

SIA apologises for 'insensitivity'

10.20am: After getting a drubbing on social media for making statements deemed "insensitive" after the downing of flight MH17, Singapore Airlines Ltd (SIA) issued a public apology on Saturday and expressed solidarity with families affected by the air tragedy said Reuters .

Hours after the Malaysia Airlines jetliner was shot down in eastern Ukraine on Thursday, killing 298 people, SIA's Facebook and Twitter updates said its own flights were not using Ukraine airspace.

That triggered a flood of angry responses, with many lambasting SIA for not offering condolences to the victims' families and for mounting what some perceived as a publicity stunt during a crisis involving its neighbouring country's flagship airline.

SIA later also clarified that its flights had been re-routed to alternative paths that were away from Ukrainian airspace after the shooting of MH17.

In a statement on Saturday, a spokesman from SIA said, "We are aware of that our Facebook and Twitter update on Friday morning may have come across as insensitive to some."

"We recognise that the information could have been better communicated and we sincerely apologise if it had offended our customers and anyone else in the online community."

According to Flightradar24, an online flight-tracking service, 66 other carriers flew hundreds of times in the area where MH17 was shot down in the last week.

Malaysia flew there 48 times and SIA 75 times. The flight-tracking service also published an image showing an SIA flight from Copenhagen to Singapore was about 25 kilometres (15 miles) from MH17 when the Malaysian jet was brought down.

Liow Tiong Lai heads to Kiev

8am : According to Bernama , Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai left for Ukraine together with a six-member delegation at 11.59pm Saturday to assist the Malaysian team in the operation following the crash of MAS flight MH17 in east Ukraine on Thursday.        

He said they would transit in Amsterdam before proceeding to Kiev and were expected to arrive there at 1pm (Kiev time) tomorrow.     

"This is a call of duty and I'm directed (to go) to Kiev and I'm sure that we can facilitate the movement of the investigation team to the crash site," he said.    

The delegation includes the director-general of the Department of Civil Aviation (DCA), Malaysia Airlines chairman and investigators.  

"I cannot ascertain how long I will be there...I must ensure that all negotiation processes and search operations proceed smoothly," Liow ( right ) told reporters before entering the departure hall at the KL International Airport last night.   

Asked when family members of the victims would be brought to the site of the accident, he said their (victims' families) safety must be given priority because the area was not safe.          

"We have to ensure their safety before they can be taken there," he said, adding that further developments would be disclosed at a media conference later.    

He said that he would meet with Ukraine's Transport Minister and Foreign Minister for discussions.     

Liow said he would also ensure that the Malaysian investigation team could meet with the National Bureau Of Accidents, Ukraine which had formed a special commission to investigate the incident.