Reports from earlier today indicated that 282 bodies were aboard the refrigerated train carrying the remains of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 victims from the crash site into territory controlled by the Ukrainian government. (There were 298 people thought to have died in the crash.) But Dutch official Jan Tuinder, who is in charge of preparing the bodies for transport from the city of Kharkiv to the Netherlands, now says that only 200 bodies arrived in Kharkiv. From the Washington Post:
The number of bodies that arrived in the train’s refrigerated rail cars was significantly lower than the 282 bodies, plus 87 body parts believed to belong to the remaining 16 victims, that Ukrainian officials have said were recovered. The train, which left the rebel-held mining town of Torez on Monday night, took more than 17 hours to travel a route that normally takes five hours or less.
Ukrainian officials previously accused rebels of moving 38 bodies from the crash site to the city of Donetsk, presumably in an effort to hide evidence that the plane was shot down.
Read more of Slate’s coverage on Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.
