DHAKA: Pro-Russian separatists say they have loaded a train with 196 bodies recovered from the crash site of the Malaysian airliner shot down in eastern Ukraine.

International news agencies said on Sunday no bodies remained at the crash site, a day after media reported rebels putting bagged bodies onto trucks and driving them away.

No armed separatists were seen at the site, reports Al Jazeera.

Media also said that the train would be headed to a rebel-held town, although this information was not confirmed by another source.

Ukraine and the separatists accuse each other of firing a surface-to-air missile at the passenger jet as it flew from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur 33,000 feet above eastern Ukraine.

Both deny the charge. All of those on the plane - 283 passengers and 15 crew - were killed.

Alexander Pilyushny, an emergency worker combing the crash site for body parts on Sunday morning, told media that it took the rebels several hours to take away the bodies on Saturday.

He said he and other emergency workers had no choice but to hand the bodies over to the rebels.

‘They are armed and we are not,’ Pilyushny said. ‘The rebels came, put the bodies onto the trucks and took them away somewhere.’

Pilyushny could not explain what happened to the more than 100 bodies of plane victims that have not yet been recovered. 

Earlier, the Ukraine government claimed it had reached a preliminary deal with the separatists to remove the bodies.

BDST: 2053 HRS, JUL 20, 2014