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'AIRCRAFT HIT BY MISSILE'

Malaysian plane crashes in Ukraine; 295 dead?

Moscow, July 17, 2014

A Malaysian passenger airliner with 295 people on board crashed in Ukraine near the Russian border on Thursday, the Interfax news agency cited an aviation industry source as saying.

The plane was brought down by a Buk ground-to-air missile, an Interfax report quoted an Ukraine official as saying. He blamed separatists for the attack.

The Boeing plane was flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, it said. Reuters could not immediately confirm the report.

An Ukrainian Interior Ministry adviser said 280 passengers and 15 crew members had died in the crash.

A Malaysia Airlines Twitter feed said the airline has lost contact with flight MH17 from Amsterdam and the last known position was over Ukraine.

The Interfax report said the plane came down 50 km (20 miles) short of entering Russian airspace. It "began to drop, afterwards it was found burning on the ground on Ukrainian territory," the unnamed source said.

The plane appeared to have come down in a region of military action where Ukrainian government forces are battling pro-Russian separatists.

A separate unnamed source in the Ukrainian security apparatus, quoted by Interfax, said the plane disappeared from radar at a height of 10,000 metres after which it came down near the town of Shakhtyorsk. - Reuters




Tags: Malaysian | plane | crash | Ukraine |

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