John McCain Unveils True Motive For Shooting MH-17 To Escalate War With Russia

The flight, from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was carrying 298 people, 154 of them Dutch and 15 crew members, all confirmed to be Malaysian.

There were no survivors from the crash, which left wreckage and bodies scattered across miles of rebel-held territory near the border with Russia.

The Boeing 777 took off from Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport and was expected to land approximately 13 hours later in Kuala Lumpur.

However, the plane crashed in eastern Ukraine at 1621 local time, in an area that has seen intense fighting between the Ukrainian military and pro-Russian separatists in recent months, near the village of Grabovo, some 40km from the Russian border.

The plane was flying at an altitude of 10,000 metres before the crash, leading to claims it was shot down by a surface-to-air missile.

Two U.S. officials said Washington strongly suspected the plane was downed by a sophisticated surface-to-air missile fired by Ukrainian separatists backed by Moscow.

Leaders of the rebels' self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic denied any involvement and said a Ukrainian air force jet had brought down the intercontinental flight.

Russia's Defence Ministry later pointed the finger at Ukrainian ground forces, saying it had picked up radar activity from a Ukrainian missile system south of Donetsk when the airliner was brought down, Russian media reported.

The Ukrainian security council said no missiles had been fired from the armouries of its armed forces.