MH17 crash: OSCE investigators reach east Ukraine site

International investigators have arrived at the crash site of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, after rebels in eastern Ukraine allowed them access.

Some 30 monitors arrived by helicopter at the scene near the village of Grabovo where the plane, carrying 298 people, crashed on Thursday.

The two sides in Ukraine's civil conflict have accused each other of shooting the jet down with a missile.

The UN Security Council has now begun an emergency meeting in New York.

The Boeing 777 was flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. It fell between Krasni Luch in Luhansk region and Shakhtarsk in the neighbouring region of Donetsk.

Latest figures released by Malaysia Airlines show the plane was carrying at least 189 Dutch nationals, 27 Australians, 44 Malaysians (including 15 crew), 12 Indonesians and nine Britons.

The dead include world-renowned Dutch researcher Joep Lange who was among a number of passengers en route to an international Aids conference in Australia.

It is the second disaster suffered by Malaysia Airlines this year. Flight MH370 disappeared en route from Malaysia to China in March and has still not been found.

Ahead of the Security Council meeting, the UN called for a "full, thorough and independent investigation".

US envoy to the UN Samantha Power said the plane was "likely downed by a surface-to-air missile operated from a separatist-held location".

She said the UN had a "duty to everyone to determine why that jet fell out of the sky and stop at nothing to bring those responsible to justice"