The OSCE rights and security organisation said on Friday more than 60 international experts, including Dutch and Australians, had reached the site where a Malaysian airliner came down in eastern Ukraine.

"Recovery work starts immediately," the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said on Twitter.

A much smaller group of experts had reached the site on Thursday for the first time in several days after Ukrainian forces halted offensive operations against pro-Russian rebels in the area.

[More to follow]