Kiev : Another plane carrying remains of the victims from the crashed Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 took off from Ukraine’s eastern city of Kharkov, officials said Monday.
The Ukrainian infrastructure ministry said the aircraft would also deliver personal belongings of MH17 passengers to their relatives in the Netherlands, Xinhua reported.
However, the exact number of bodies and body parts loaded onto the plane was still unknown.
The remains of victims were recovered from the MH17 crash site by the Australian and Dutch experts and transferred to Kharkov Saturday, after the search was completed in one of the five zones assigned to the experts.
The investigation team failed to reach the crash site Monday due to heavy fighting between Ukrainian government forces and insurgents near the area.
Over the past 24 hours, at least five Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 14 others wounded in battles with the rebels, officials said.
Last week, 227 coffins with bodies of MH17 crash victims were taken to the Netherlands for identification.
The Boeing 777 went down July 17 in the rebel-held eastern Ukraine near the Russian border, killing all 298 people on board.