Black boxes recovered?

The prime minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, Alexander Borodai, told a news conference Sunday that "jet parts resembling the black boxes were discovered at the crash site," and that the devices would be handed over to the International Civil Aviation Organization.

He also said the bodies recovered from the crash site in eastern Ukraine - of which there are 196 - would remain in refrigerated containers at a train station in the town of Torez 15 kilometers (9 miles) away until the arrival of an aviation delegation.

It was not immediately clear Sunday if the rebels and the Ukrainian government were working together to move the bodies.

Borodai also insisted that rebels had not interfered with the crash investigation, despite reports by Western leaders and international monitors that evidence had been tampered with or debris from the flight looted.

Ukraine and the separatists accuse each other of downing the Malaysia Airlines passenger jet on Thursday with a surface-to-air missile as it flew over the east of the country. All those on board the flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur – 283 passengers and 15 crew – were killed.

Both deny shooting down the plane. The government in Kyiv has also accused Russia of sending sophisticated arms to the rebels, which Moscow denies.

Victims mourned

An international AIDS conference opened in Australia on Sunday with a moment in silence in tribute to the six delegates who were killed en route to the event when the plane was shot down.

Prominent Dutch researcher Joep Lange, former president of the International AIDS Society, was among the dead as well as World Health Organization spokesman Glenn Thomas.

hc/pfd (Reuters, AFP, AP, dpa)