Key points
- A Malaysian airliner has crashed in Ukraine, near Russian border
- Malaysia Airlines says it contact was lost with Flight MH17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur at 1415 GMT.
- There were 280 passengers and 15 crew members on board
- There are reports of bodies and burning wreckage on the ground
- The Ukrainian military and pro-Russian rebels have accused each other of shooting down the plane; both sides say they were not responsible.
- Several airlines, including Lufthansa and Air France, say they will now avoid eastern Ukrainian airspace
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LIVE TEXT
By Sean Clare, Amber Dawson, Sarah Fowler and Jastinder Khera.
18:33
An Associated Press reporter at the scene has counted at least 22 bodies at the scene of the crash.
18:31
Dutch PM Mark Rutte is returning to the Netherlands from a summit in Brussels, Reuters reports.
In a statement, he said he was "deeply shocked" by reports of the crashed plane, which took off from the Dutch capital Amsterdam, but added "much is still unclear about the facts, circumstances and the passengers".
ABC News
tweets: JUST IN: US State Dept. working to determine if there were any US citizens on board Flight MH17 - @AliABCNews
18:30.
Independent Malaysian news portal Malaysiakini says new transport minister Liow Tiong-lai is on his way back to Kuala Lumpur to handle the MH17 incident. He was visiting Beijing where his itinerary included discussion of the search of the missing flight MH370 with China.
18:29.
Another image of the debris of the Boeing 777 scattered on the ground:
Russian News Agency RIA Novosti
tweets: Putin expresses his "sincere condolences" to Malaysian PM on MH17 aircraft crash.
18:25
Graphic images from the crash site, showing debris and bodies, are currently being broadcast by the privately-owned pro-Kremlin rolling Russian news channel LifeNews, our colleagues at BBC Monitoring report.
18:24
The Interfax news agency quotes Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko as saying the incident was a "terrorist act", Reuters reports.
18:20
The UK department of transport issues a statement stating: "Flights already airborne are being routed around the area by air traffic control in the region." Pilots around the world are being advised to plan routes that avoid the area, it adds.
18:19
Malaysia Airlines is expected to hold a press conference on the incident at 04:00 local time (21:00 BST), the BBC understands.
18:16
The plane went down near the village of Grabovo, which is currently under the control of armed pro-Russian separatists. The region has been the scene of severe fighting between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatist rebels in recent days, AP reports.
18:16
As well as Lufthansa, Russian airliner Transaero has also announced it is avoiding Ukrainian airspace for all future flights following the Malaysia airlines crash, Reuters reports.
Reuters
tweets: #BREAKING: Air France says has decided to avoid airspace of Eastern Ukraine.
18:05
Emergency services officials are surveying the crash site:
18:03
Flight MH17 took off from Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport at 12:14 local time. This AFP image was reportedly taken at the time.
Carl Boylin in Leeds, UK
emails: All aircraft should be rerouted in the short term to avoid any further loss of life.
17:59
German airline Lufthansa says it has decided to avoid eastern Ukrainian air space with immediate effect, Reuters reports.
17:58
Another photograph from the crash site, taken by Reuters:
17:57
"The portable air defence systems which we have, they work at a maximum of three to four thousand metres. Therefore, it is possible to say virtually before the start of the investigation that the Ukrainian armed forces destroyed this," separatist spokesman Sergey Kavtaradze says.
17:57
A spokesman for pro-Russian separatists in the Donetsk region told Russia's Rossiya TV that they were not capable of bringing down a commercial airliner flying at 10,000 metres.
17:56
Reuters has this photograph of a Ukrainian emergencies ministry worker at the crash site:
Reuters news agency
tweets: The site of a Malaysia Airlines plane crash in the settlement of Grabovo in Donetsk region:http://bit.ly/1eP5C4X
17:53
Malaysia's Defence Minister Hishamuddin Hussein, who dealt with the disappearance of MH370 in March in his capacity as acting transport minister, has appealed for calm on Twitter, saying he is working with the foreign, transport and prime minister on the issue - via BBC Monitoring.
17:52
A statement from Virgin Airlines says it "will be re-routing a small number of our flights this evening". It says it is closely monitoring the situation.
17:51
Former UK ambassador to Russia Sir Tony Brenton tells the BBC if the plane has been shot down it has "quite profound political implications". He says sanctions and "world condemnation" of the pro-Russia rebels could follow if it turns out they have shot down the plane.
17:50
Malaysia Airlines has released a statement saying it received notification from Ukrainian air traffic control that it had lost contact with flight MH17 at 1415 GMT at 30km from Tamak waypoint, approximately 50km (31 miles) from the Russia-Ukraine border.
17:46
AFP quotes the Kremlin as saying that Mr Putin "informed [President Obama] about an air-traffic controllers' report that came just before their phone conversation that a Malaysian plane crashed in Ukraine".
17:45
US President Barack Obama has spoken via telephone to Russian President Vladimir Putin about the airplane crash, Reuters reports. The call had already been pre-planned on the situation in Ukraine, it adds.
17:43
Novorossiya, one of several major pro-Russia separatist accounts on Twitter, says in a tweet (in Russian) that the Ukrainian air force brought down the Malaysia Airlines aircraft, our colleagues at BBC Monitoring report.
Mike Boxall in Cambridge, UK
emails: Why have international airlines continued to fly across this area of eastern Ukraine during this time of conflict? We have been reading reports of the increasing loss of military aircraft in this area, surely the airlines have a standard of customer care which should preclude overflying areas of conflict?
Air transport editor for Flight International, David Kaminski
tweets: Point of loss of #MH17 appears to coincide with airspace boundary between Kiev and Dnipropetrovsk flight information regions.
17:38
If it was a missile that brought the aircraft down, it would have to be a long range one as opposed to a portable system, aviation analyst Chris Yates tells BBC Radio 4's PM programme.
17:34
A map of the reported crash site in eastern Ukraine:
17:33
According to a Reuters reporter at the scene, broken pieces of wing marked with Malaysia Airlines' red and blue - similar to those pictured below - have been seen among the wreckage.
17:32
The BBC's Oleg Boldyrev in Moscow says the rebels do not have out-dated equipment. What they have equals or maybe surpasses the Ukrainian government's capabilities. He says some reports say the rebels even have fighter planes reportedly flown from Crimea and that possibility should not be excluded.
17:31
Russian news agency RIA Novosti is also reporting that scores of bodies in Donetsk Region have been found strewn on the ground next to the plane wreckage.
Reuters News Agency
tweets: #BREAKING: Eastern Ukraine separatist leader Alexander Borodai says airliner shot down by Ukrainian gov. forces, Kiev denied involvement
17:30
The Malaysia Airlines plane could have been shot down, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko says in a statement. "This is a third such tragic event in recent days, when Ukrainian military An-26 and Su-25 aircraft have been shot down from Russian territory, " the statement says. "The Ukrainian armed forces did not attempt to shoot down targets in the air."
Flight tracking site Flightradar24
tweets: Last positions of #MH17 directly from Flightradar24 database. Signal was lost around 13:21 UTC at 33,000 feet.
17:28
According to Reuters, there are dozens of bodies scattered around the wreckage of the jet. The agency quotes an emergencies services rescue worker as saying at least 100 bodies had so far been found at the scene, and that debris from the wreckage was scattered across an area up to about 15 km (nine miles) in diameter.
17:26
Pro-Russia separatists in Donetsk have denied bringing down the aircraft, according to Interfax. "The plane was shot down by the Ukrainian side. We simply have no air defence systems of this kind," separatist spokesman Sergey Kavtaradze told the agency.
17:20
Sources says the aircraft was a Boeing 777, similar to this one photographed earlier this year:
Jonathan Beale - Defence correspondent, BBC News
The only other possibility is for an aircraft at that height to be downed by a fighter carrying air-to-air missiles.
The US will have access to satellite imagery that should be able to identify ultra-violet plumes if a long-range surface-to-air missile was fired.
Jonathan Beale - Defence correspondent, BBC News
A defence expert has told the BBC that shooting down a plane at 10,000 metres (9.7 miles) would have required a long-range surface-to-air missile - possibly guided by radar. That suggests it is unlikely it could have been downed by a portable air defence missile, or Manpad, which has a much shorter range.
17:15
Interfax news agency quotes the Ukrainian presidential press service as saying that the Ukrainian armed forces were not involved in the Malaysian passenger plane "being brought down".
17:14
A Reuters reporter has reached the scene and has described seeing burning wreckage of the airplane, with bodies on the ground, the agency reports.
Mohd Najib Tun Razak, Malaysian prime minister
tweets: I am shocked by reports that an MH plane crashed. We are launching an immediate investigation.
17:09
A number of military planes have been shot down by missiles in recent weeks over eastern Ukraine, where pro-Russian separatist rebels have been fighting government forces.
17:08
BBC correspondent Oleg Boldyrev in Moscow says unconfirmed reports suggest people have seen wreckage on the ground. He adds that any investigation into what could have happened would be a "nightmare" for the authorities, given the tensions in the area.
17:07
US stocks have fallen sharply amid reports of the latest Malaysia Airlines flight incident, according to AFP.
Zeke Miller, Political reporter at Time Magazine
tweets: WH: Obama has been briefed on reports of the plane
17:06
If the deaths on board this flight are confirmed, it would be the second tragedy to strike Malaysia Airlines this year after the disappearance of Flight MH370 in March with 227 passengers and 12 members of crew on board - one of the greatest aviation mysteries of all time.
17:05
The Ukrainian prime minister has reportedly launched an investigation into what he calls the "airplane catastrophe", according to Reuters.
17:02
The Interfax-Ukraine news agency has quoted a Ukrainian Interior Ministry as saying he believes all 295 passengers on board have been killed.
16:59
This map shows where contact was apparently lost with flight MH17 between Amsterdam and Kuala Lumpur:
16:54
The UK Foreign Office says it is aware of the reports and is "urgently working to establish what has happened".
Boeing Airplanes
tweets: We are aware of reports on MH17. We're gathering more information.
16:50
The Associated Press says one of its journalists saw a similar launcher near the eastern Ukrainian town of Snizhe earlier on Thursday.
16:50
An advisor to the Ukrainian interior minister, Anton Gerashenko, says the plane was flying at an altitude of 10,000 metres (33,000 feet) when it was "hit by a missile fired from a Buk launcher", in a post on his Facebook page, according to the Associated Press.
16:42
Aviation expert Chris Yates says the plane would have been full, if reports that it was carrying 295 passengers are correct. He says the plane would have been flying at a height of some six miles (9.7km).
16:39 Breaking News
Malaysia Airlines tweets it has lost contact with flight MH17 from Amsterdam. "The last known position was over Ukrainian airspace," it says. "More details to follow."
16:36
The BBC's Daniel Sandford in Moscow says that the area in which the plane is reported to have come down is right in the centre of the area controlled by anti-Kiev rebels - although of course details are still coming in.
16:36
Again according to the Interfax agency only, Anton Herashchenko an adviser to the Ukrainian deputy interior minister has apparently confirmed the crash.
16:34
The Interfax news agency reported 295 people - 280 passengers and 15 crew members - were on board the flight, en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.
16:31
The Boeing 777 plane was flying in an international air corridor over eastern Ukraine when it crashed, the Russian news agency reported.
16:27
The crash has reportedly happened on the Ukrainian side of the Russia - Ukraine border, scene of tension between the two countries.
16:24
Reports suggest a passenger plane has crashed in eastern Ukraine. The early reports come from an "aviation source" who was quoted by the privately-owned Russian Interfax news agency. BBC © 2014
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