Transfer news: Borussia Dortmund coach Jurgen Klopp rules out selling Marco Reus or Mats Hummels

Borussia Dortmund coach Jurgen Klopp has ruled out selling Marco Reus or Mats Hummels this summer, insisting that none of his club's big names will be following Robert Lewandowski out of the club.

Reus, who will miss the start of the season due to the ankle injury which also ruled him out of the World Cup, has regularly attracted interest from top European clubs while Hummels has more recently been linked with a €20million (£15.8m) bid from Manchester United.

That valuation has been branded derisory by Klopp, who has absolutely no intention of depriving himself of two key players.

"What was today's rumour? Mats to Man U? For how much? 20 million? For a sum like that, you can forget about it anyway," Klopp told the Ruhr Nachrichten newspaper.

"Marco and Mats will be playing for us next season. I can assure everybody that there is no sign at all that either of them want to leave."

Both are contracted to Dortmund until 2017, although Reus is rumoured to have a clause in his contract allowing him to leave the Westphalian club next summer for €35million (£27.7m) - the same figure Mario Gotze was bought out of his contract by Bayern Munich for last summer.

Transfer News: Real Madrid sign James Rodriguez from Monaco in £63million deal

Real Madrid have signed Colombian star James Rodriguez from Monaco in a £63million deal.

The 23-year-old successfully passed a medical in Madrid this morning before agreeing a six-year deal and is scheduled to be unveiled in the Spanish capital this evening.

Rodriguez will join up with Cristiano Ronaldo, Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema to provide a formidable attacking threat for the Champions League winners.

Rodriguez was one of the stars of the World Cup, scoring six goals for his country on his way to winning the tournament’s Golden Boot award.

The attacking midfielder scored the goal of the tournament at the World Cup with a stunning volley against Uruguay in the last 16.

He makes the move to the Spanish capital after spending one season at Monaco, whom he joined from FC Porto for £35million last summer.

Rodriguez scored nine goals and registered 12 assists for Monaco last season as they finished second in Ligue 1 behind Paris Saint-Germain.

"The club had no intention to sell the player, however the time came when the solution of a transfer was considered to be the most beneficial solution for all parties."

Monaco club statement

A Real statement read: "The player will be presented today, Tuesday 22 July, at 20:00 CET (7pm), in the Santiago Bernabéu's presidential box.

"Following that, James Rodríguez will take his first steps on the Santiago Bernabéu's pitch wearing the Real Madrid jersey and will then answer questions from the media outlets in attendance in the press room."

A statement on Monaco’s official website read: "The club would like to take the opportunity to thank James for the role he played in getting the club back to the Champions League and wishes him the very best for the future.

"The club had no intention to sell the player, however the time came when the solution of a transfer was considered to be the most beneficial solution for all parties.

"Monaco is proud to be a party to one of the most significant transfers in football history.

"Monaco is a club that will continue to grow and remains focused on the future. More than ever it has the ambition to strengthen the team and continue to progress for next season."

Rodriguez began his professional career with Colombian side Envigado before moving down to Argentinian club Banfield aged 17.

His performances for the Buenos Aires outfit attracted the attention of Porto, who signed him for £4million in 2010, and three years later he joined Monaco for £38.5million after helping the Portuguese side win a hat-trick of league titles and the 2011 Europa League.

Train carrying bodies of MH17 victims arrives in Ukrainian-controlled city

Kharkiv, Ukraine (CNN) -- A train carried the remains of most victims from Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 from the crash site in rebel-controlled territory to a government-controlled city Tuesday -- getting the bodies one step closer to their grieving families around the world.

The train traveled from the crash site in rebel-controlled eastern Ukraine and arrived at a rail station in Kharkiv and were taken to a closed military area, where the 282 bodies will be put in coffins flown in from the Netherlands.

The bodies will eventually be taken to the Netherlands, where most of the passengers were from.

But a litany of obstacles remain -- not just in handling the remains, but in figuring out how and why MH17 was shot down over eastern Ukraine.

Five days after the the plane carrying 298 people plunged from the sky, here's the latest:

The victims

As authorities wait to process the 282 bodies, the remains of 16 people were still missing as of Monday, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko told CNN's Christiane Amanpour.

The Ukrainian government has said 87 "body fragments" had been recovered from the sprawling crash site, but it's unclear who they may have belonged to.

The grisly scene was marred by reports that pro-Russian Ukrainian rebels, who control the area, had looted personal items from the scene and prevented international investigators from entering.

Poroshenko said the rebels' conduct was "barbaric."

But Dutch forensics experts who inspected the train Monday were "more or less" satisfied with how the bodies were being stored," said Michael Bociurkiw, the spokesman for monitors from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

The remains will be flown to Amsterdam on board a Dutch C-130 Hercules, officials said.

An Australian plane will also be involved in taking the bodies from Ukraine to Holland, Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said Tuesday.

Dutch Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans said bringing the victims' remains home is his country's top priority.

"To my dying day, I will not understand that it took so much time for the rescue workers to be allowed to do their difficult jobs," he told the U.N. Security Council on Monday, "and that human remains should be used in a political game."

The 'black boxes'

Ukrainian rebels gave Malaysian officials the data recorders from downed Flight 17 on Tuesday after days of attempts by the Malaysian government.

"In recent days, we have been working behind the scenes to establish contact with those in charge of the MH17 crash site," Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said early Tuesday morning.

Najib said he spoke with rebel leader Alexander Borodai and reached an agreement for the transfer of the black boxes.

Malaysian officials will keep the black boxes while an international investigation team is being formalized, Najib said.

Once the team is finalized, "we will pass the black boxes to the international investigation team for further analysis," he said.

The voice recorder could include audio from the cockpit, which would show whether the pilots knew the plane had been hit, said Mary Schiavo, a CNN aviation analyst and former inspector general for the U.S. Department of Transportation.

And the flight data recorder will give investigators information about engine settings, pressurization and electronic communications, among other details, she said.

But even the black boxes might not answer the two most pressing questions: who shot down the plane, and why.

The blame game

The U.N. Security Council adopted a resolution Monday demanding full access to the crash site and condemning the downing of the plane.

The resolution won unanimous approval from the 15-member council, which includes Russia. It did not specify who was responsible for the crash.

U.S. and other officials have said it appears the plane was shot down by a sophisticated surface-to-air missile located within rebel-held territory. Evidence supporting that conclusion includes telephone intercepts purporting to be pro-Russian rebels discussing the shootdown and video of a Buk missile launcher traveling into Russia with at least one missile missing.

Obama, British Prime Minister David Cameron and others have said the pro-Russian rebels could not have shot such a high-flying jet down without weapons and training from Russia.

Obama called on Russia to rein in the rebel fighters, who he said had treated remains poorly and removed evidence from the site.

"What exactly are they trying to hide?" he said.

Officials said Monday that U.S. intelligence analysts are examining phone intercepts, social media posts and information gathered on the ground to see if Russian officials played a direct role in the shootdown, according to two U.S. officials directly familiar with the latest assessment. The officials declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the situation.

"We are trying to determine if they manned it, advised, or pulled the trigger," one of the officials told CNN.

Pro-Russian rebels have repeatedly denied responsibility for the attack.

"This is an information war," Borodai said. "We don't have the technical ability to destroy this plane. Ukrainians are not interested in the truth."

Moscow has strongly denied claims it pulled the trigger. Russian Army Lt. Gen. Andrei Kartapolov suggested a Ukrainian jet fighter may have shot the plane down.

Russian monitoring showed a Ukrainian Su-25 fighter jet flying along the same route and within 3 kilometers to 5 kilometers (1.9 miles to 3.1 miles) of Flight 17, Kartapolov said, according to Russian state media.

"We would like to know why the Ukrainian plane was flying along a civilian route on the same flight path as the Malaysian Boeing," Kartapolov said, according to the reports.

In his interview with Amanpour, Poroshenko rejected the Russian suggestion, saying all Ukrainian aircraft were on the ground at the time.

Vitaly Churkin, Russia's ambassador to the United Nations, also blamed Ukraine for the crash on Monday. But when asked about audio recordings purporting to show pro-Russian separatists talking about shooting down a plane, he suggested that if they did, it was an accident.

"According to them, the people from the east were saying that they shot down a military jet," he said. "If they think they shot down a military jet, it was confusion. If it was confusion, it was not an act of terrorism."

Ukrainian President: The world must choose sides

So much we don't know -- eight unanswered questions

Who were the victims?

If Russia continues to back separatists in Ukraine, the costs to Russia will increase, says U.S. President Obama.

Hrabove, Ukraine (CNN) -- Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and U.S. President Barack Obama lashed out Monday at Russia over conditions at the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, saying Russian-backed rebels at the site continue to impede efforts to recover bodies and investigate exactly what happened.

Poroshenko, speaking to CNN's Christiane Amanpour, pleaded for international solidarity against the rebels fighting the government in Kiev.

"I don't see any differences" between 9/11, the Lockerbie bombing and the attack on Flight 17, Poroshenko said.

Such terrorism is a danger to the "whole world" and to "global security," he said.

Obama, speaking at nearly the same time in Washington, called on Russia to rein in the rebel fighters believed by many international leaders to be responsible for downing the passenger jet and killing all 298 aboard.

He said Russia has so far failed to stop the rebels from impeding investigators at the site and accused them of treating remains poorly and removing evidence from the site.

"What exactly are they trying to hide?" he said.

Obama said it was time for Russia to exert what he called its "enormous influence" over the rebel fighters -- who U.S. and other officials have said are armed, trained and backed by Russia -- to persuade them to better cooperate with the international investigation.

"It's the least they can do," he said.

Despite the stern tone of the Ukrainian and U.S. leaders, the spokesman for a team of European monitors at the site said conditions have improved since a chilly reception immediately after Flight 17 fell from the sky.

"Today we have three Dutch forensics experts with us, and they're getting pretty much unfettered access," Michael Bociurkiw, the spokesman for monitors from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, told CNN's Chris Cuomo.

The rebels even provided some perimeter security to keep journalists at bay, creating a "dome of tranquility" for the OSCE monitors, Dutch forensic experts and a handful of Ukrainian aviation experts now at the scene, Bociurkiw said separately in a briefing for reporters hosted by the Ukrainian Crisis Media Center.

Handling the remains

Rebels also were expected to allow a train carrying the remains of 251 of the 298 passengers to travel to the eastern city of Kharkiv at 7 p.m. (noon ET), according to Ukrainian Vice Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman.

Dutch forensics experts who inspected the train Monday were "more or less" satisfied with how the bodies were being stored," Bociurkiw said.

Poroshenko told Amanpour that the remains of 16 people were still missing. Earlier, the Ukrainian government issued a statement saying that 282 bodies and 87 "body fragments" had been recovered from the sprawling crash site.

Ukrainian government officials have said the bodies will eventually be taken to Amsterdam. Most of those who died in the crash were Dutch.

Bociurkiw did say it remains difficult to get to the site, and fighting between rebels and government forces in Donetsk could have a significant impact on the investigation, he said.

Ukrainian officials and rebel forces reported fighting around the train station in Donetsk on Monday, with city officials reporting damage to a residential building near the train station and a nearby market catching fire after it was shelled. The train station, however, remained in operation, the city officials said.

With air service out, an interruption in train service could hinder the ability of investigators to get into and out of the site, Bociurkiw said.

"That's very crucial, because it's the only remaining transport link between here and really the outside world."

It could also affect efforts to transport the remains of the 298 people who died when Flight 17 plummeted to the ground -- the apparent victims of a surface-to-air missile strike that U.S. officials have said appeared to be launched from rebel-held territory near the Russian border.

Bociurkiw had no information about the status of a team of international crash experts staging in Kharkiv to inspect the debris.

Earlier, the Ukrainian government issued a news release saying the experts had reviewed photos of the crash scene.

Another team from the Netherlands remains in Kiev, according to the Dutch Foreign Ministry.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte met with relatives and friends of victims Monday, calling the session filled with sadness and "very touching."

"All of the Netherlands is feeling their fury. All of the Netherlands is sharing their deep sadness, and all of the Netherlands is just gathering around all the next of kin," he said.

'An outrage made in Moscow'

Meanwhile, intelligence analysts were working furiously to determine whether Russian officials had any direct involvement in the downing of the jetliner -- an accusation Moscow has strongly denied.

U.S. analysts are examining phone intercepts, social media posts and information gathered on the ground to see what role, if any, Russian officials may have played, according to two U.S. officials directly familiar with the latest assessment who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the situation.

"We are trying to determine if they manned it, advised, or pulled the trigger," one of the officials told CNN.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said there's no shortage of evidence that pro-Russian rebels shot down the jet.

There's video of a launcher with one surface-to-air missile missing, imagery showing the firing and intercepted calls with rebels claiming credit for the strike, Kerry said.

"We know from intercepts ... that those are in fact the voices of separatists," he told CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday. "And now we have a video showing a launcher moving back through a particular area there out into Russia with at least one missing missile on it."

British Prime Minister David Cameron didn't mince words either on who was to blame. In an op-ed in The Sunday Times, he called the plane crash and its aftermath "an outrage made in Moscow."

Russian President Vladimir Putin fired back with a video statement posted on the Kremlin's official website early Monday, arguing that his country has been pushing for peace in Ukraine.

"We have repeatedly called on all parties to immediately stop the bloodshed and to sit down at the negotiating table. We can confidently say that if June 28 fighting in eastern Ukraine did not resume, this tragedy most likely would not have happened," he said. "However, no one should have the right to use this tragedy to achieve selfish political objectives. Such events should not divide but unite people."

He stressed that safety must be guaranteed for international experts investigating the crash.

"We must do everything to ensure their work has full and absolute security (and) ensure necessary humanitarian corridors are provided," Putin said.

On Monday, Russian officials floated the possibility that a Ukrainian fighter jet might have downed the plane.

Russian monitoring showed a Ukrainian Su-25 fighter jet flying along the same route and within 3 kilometers to 5 kilometers (1.9 miles to 3.1 miles) of Flight 17, Lt. Gen. Andrei Kartapolov of the Russian Army General Staff said at a news conference, Russian state media reported.

"We would like to know why the Ukrainian plane was flying along a civilian route on the same flight path as the Malaysian Boeing," Kartapolov said, according to the reports.

Pro-Russian rebels have also denied responsibility for the shootdown.

In an interview with Cuomo broadcast Monday on CNN's "New Day," the self-declared rebel Prime Minister in Donetsk, Alexander Borodai, said he believed Ukrainian forces either shot the plane down with a surface-to-air missile or, as the Russian general suggested, one of its own fighter jets.

"We didn't have motives and desire to do that, and it is obvious that Ukrainians have them," he said. "I can't say about desire, but motive is obvious that the crash of this plane was beneficial to them."

'Black boxes' found?

Borodai also told Cuomo that he believes rebels have retrieved the jet's "black boxes," but that he couldn't say for sure because he is not a technical expert.

Earlier, Borodai said the devices are under guard in the region. They will not be given to Ukrainian officials, he said.

Reuters distributed video Sunday of what appeared to be an inflight recorder found by a worker in a field. The agency labeled the video, shot Friday, as showing one of the two flight data recorders from Flight 17.

Some Malaysian investigators flew to the Ukrainian capital of Kiev on Saturday. But Malaysia's official news agency said they were still negotiating with rebels over access for their team.

Law enforcement officials from the Netherlands, the United States and Australia will help with the investigation led by the Ukrainian government.

Two FBI agents have arrived in Kiev, a senior U.S. law enforcement official said. An investigator from the National Transportation Safety Board was also there.

Gaza crisis: UN calls for ceasefire as deaths pass 500

The UN Security Council has called for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian militants in Gaza.

It comes as US Secretary of State John Kerry heads to Cairo for talks on the crisis amid a mounting death toll.

More than 500 Palestinians, mainly civilians, have been killed since the Israeli offensive began 13 days ago, Gaza's health ministry says.

Twenty Israelis - 18 of them soldiers - have died, Israel says, as it seeks to end rocket fire from Gaza.

Sunday was the deadliest day since the start of Israel's offensive, with 13 Israeli soldiers and more than 100 Palestinians killed.

Israel says it has killed at least 120 militants since Thursday night when it launched a ground offensive, the second phase of a military operation that began on 8 July.

In other developments:

• Overnight air strikes in southern Gaza kill more than 30 members of two families in Khan Younis and Rafah, local officials say
• Artillery fire and air strikes continue to the east of Gaza City, with Israeli aircraft seen over Shejaiya district for a second day, and the Maghazi neighbourhood
• Ten Hamas militants die after using tunnels in the northern Gaza Strip to infiltrate Israel near the town of Sderot, Israel says.

'Atrocious action'

Sunday's late-night UN Security Council session was convened at the request of Jordan, which is understood to have proposed a strongly worded draft resolution for consideration.

However, the 15-member council instead issued a statement to the media, with Rwanda's UN ambassador calling for "an immediate cessation of hostilities".

Israel urged residents to flee before attacking Shejaiya

Eugene Gasana said members voiced alarm at the escalation of violence during a "sobering session".

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon had earlier spoken out on the situation, describing an Israeli assault on the densely populated Shejaiya neighbourhood of Gaza as "an atrocious action".

More than 60 Palestinians alone were killed during heavy shelling in Shejaiya, in what Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called "a massacre".

He called for urgent talks, saying the "situation is intolerable" in Gaza and describing the Israeli attacks as "crimes against humanity."

Hospitals in Gaza City are struggling to manage the influx of injuries

Israel launched a ground offensive last week, saying the operation was crucial to weakening Hamas

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to continue operations "as much as we need to" despite the number of Israeli soldiers killed rising to 18 at the weekend.

Two of the soldiers killed were American citizens, US state department spokesperson Jen Psaki said.

Sunday's death toll for Israel's military is higher than that sustained during the entire three-week duration of Israel's last ground offensive in Gaza in 2008-2009.

The deaths of so many soldiers on a single day will shock Israeli society, the BBC's Chris Morris reports from southern Israel.

Israel has lost 18 soldiers - 13 killed in a single day on Sunday

Palestinians celebrated in Gaza and the West Bank after Hamas said it captured an Israeli soldier - a claim Israel denied

Hamas said on Sunday evening that it had captured an Israeli soldier, prompting celebrations on the streets of Gaza and West Bank.

However Israel's UN ambassador Ron Prosor denied the claim, saying "those rumours are untrue".

The UN says 83,695 people have now been displaced in Gaza and that the figure is "rising all the time".

There were scenes of panic in Shejaiya, with thousands of residents fleeing.

Analysis: Jonathan Marcus, BBC defence correspondent

The fact that the battle has moved into a heavily populated urban area means that the civilian death toll will rise markedly. With it will come added pressure from outside to end the operation once and for all.

Hamas's infiltration tunnels prompted the Israeli movement on the ground. Many civilians may have fled but clearly others remained. Now the fighting is close-up and bitter and it's taking a toll on the Israelis as well.

This may well be exactly what Hamas military commanders wanted: to draw the Israeli forces into a close urban environment, a difficult battleground for any modern army.

Rebels to give MH17 black boxes to aviation group, separatist leader says

The black boxes for the downed Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 have been found, a Ukraine rebel leader said Sunday. 

Alexander Borodai said that the devices would be handed over to the International Civil Aviation Organization.

The announcement came as international investigators and Ukrainian officials said that pro-Russia separatists forced emergency services to surrender the bodies of 196 victims of the plane crash and loaded them onto refrigerated trains bound for a rebel-held city.

Borodai said the bodies would remain in refrigerated containers at a train station in the town of Torez until the arrival of an international aviation delegation.

The surprising, rapid-fire developments Sunday morning came after a wave of international outrage over how the bodies of plane crash victims were being handled and amid fears that the armed rebels who control the territory where the plane came down could be tampering with the evidence.

Ukraine and the separatists accuse each other of firing a surface-to-air missile Thursday at Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 as it flew from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur some 33,000 feet above the battlefields of eastern Ukraine. Both deny shooting down the plane. All those onboard the flight -- 283 passengers and 15 crew -- were killed.

Ukraine says Russia has been sending sophisticated arms to the rebels, a charge that Moscow denies.

The U.S. Embassy in Kiev issued a strong statement pointing to Russian complicity in arming the rebels, saying it has concluded "that Flight MH17 was likely downed by a SA-11 surface-to-air missile from separatist-controlled territory in eastern Ukraine."  It said over the weekend of July 12-13, "Russia sent a convoy of military equipment with up to 150 vehicles, including tanks, armored personnel carriers, artillery and multiple rockets launchers" to the separatists. The statement also said Russia was training separatist fighters in southwest Russia, including on air defense systems.

The rebels have been strictly limiting the movements of international monitors and journalists at the crash site, which is near the Russian border, and Ukraine's Emergency Ministry said its workers were laboring under duress, overseen by the armed rebels.

Associated Press journalists saw reeking bodies baking in the summer heat Saturday, piled into body bags by the side of the road or still sprawled where they landed in the verdant farmland in eastern Ukraine after their plane was shot out of the sky.

By Sunday morning, AP journalists saw no bodies and no armed rebels at the crash site. Emergency workers were searching the sprawling fields only for body parts.

It was not immediately clear Sunday if the rebels and the Ukrainian government were working together or at odds with each other on recovering the bodies -- and from their comments, many of officials didn't appear to know either.

Separatists were not immediately available to comment Sunday. Despite the restrictions seen by journalists and observers at the crash site, Borodai insisted Saturday the rebels have not interfered with the work of observers.

Nataliya Khuruzhaya, a duty officer at the train station in Torez, 9 miles from the crash site, said she saw emergency workers loading plane victims' bodies Sunday morning into five sealed, refrigerated train cars.

She said the train was scheduled to head to the town of Ilovaysk, 22 miles further east toward the Russian border, but no instructions had been given about when it would leave or any possible destinations beyond Ilovaysk.

Russian news agencies said the bodies were heading to the rebel stronghold of Donetsk. Ukrainian officials say they expected to have the bodies eventually delivered to government-held city of Kharkiv, but it's unclear if the rebels will agree to do so.

Vasily Khoma, deputy of governor of the Kharkiv region where Ukraine has set up a crisis center to handle the disaster, said the Ukrainian state railway company had provided the refrigerated train cars. Kharkiv is 185 miles (300 kilometers) north of the crash site.

He said no information was available on when airplane parts would be brought to the city and that the priority now was on recovering bodies. He said a mobile lab to handle DNA analysis was being delivered from Dnipropetrovsk.

Residents in Kharkov have been inundating a special call center to offer their services as volunteers. Ten hotels in Kharkiv have said they will provide free rooms for relatives of the victims.

Earlier, Ukrainian Emergency Ministry spokeswoman Nataliya Bystro said workers at the crash site were forced to hand over the 196 bodies they had recovered to the armed rebels.

"Where they took the bodies -- we don't know," Bystro told the AP, adding she had no information about the other 102 victims' bodies.

However, Michael Bociurkiw, a spokesman for monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, said some bodies have likely been incinerated without a trace.

"We're looking at the field where the engines have come down. This was the area which was exposed to the most intense heat. We do not see any bodies here. It appears that some have been vaporized," he told reporters in Kiev, speaking via phone from the crash site Sunday.

Alexander Pilyushny, an emergency worker combing the crash site for body parts Sunday morning, told the AP it took the rebels several hours Saturday to cart away the bodies. He said he and other workers had no choice but to hand over the bodies.

"They are armed and we are not," Pilyushny said.

In a blistering article for the Sunday Times, British Prime Minister David Cameron called the attack a "direct result of Russia destabilizing a sovereign state, violating its territorial integrity, backing thuggish militias and training and arming them."

"We must turn this moment of outrage into a moment of action," he wrote.

In a coded rebuke of German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other European leaders who have blocked efforts to impose tougher sanctions on Russian President Vladimir Putin for Russia's actions in Ukraine, Cameron said Europe must now "respond robustly."

"For too long, there has been a reluctance on the part of too many European countries to face up to the implications of what is happening in eastern Ukraine," Cameron wrote.

An Associated Press journalist saw a Buk missile launcher in rebel-held territory close to the crash site Thursday just hours before the plane was brought down.

Putin and Merkel agreed Saturday in a phone call that an independent commission led by the International Civil Aviation Organization should be granted swift access to the crash site.

Dutch Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans, speaking in Kiev, demanded that the culprits be found.

"Once we have the proof, we will not stop until the people are brought to justice," he said.

Malaysia Airlines Flight 17: Eight unanswered questions

(CNN) -- Amid the chaos and the grief, the politics and the finger pointing, we are no closer to answering some key questions about the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. The crash, which killed all 298 aboard, has turned a volatile Ukrainian region into a global problem.

Here are eight questions we don't yet have the answers to.

1. Who shot down the plane?

Only a full investigation can settle that. This much we know: Flight MH17 was shot down using a surface-to-air missile in Ukrainian territory that's controlled by pro-Russian rebels.

Ukraine's government says it has "compelling evidence" that a Russian-supplied battery, manned by Russian operatives, fired the missile. The United States has also pointed the finger at the Russian-trained rebels.

"We have a video showing a launcher moving back through a particular area there, out into Russia, with at least one missing missile on it," Secretary of State John Kerry said on CNN's State of the Union on Sunday.

But Russia has denied any involvement. So have the rebels, who accuse the Ukrainians of downing the plane -- without offering proof.

2. Why would anyone target a passenger plane?

If indeed the rebels are behind the attack, they may have mistaken the plane for a Ukrainian military craft. In the past few months, the rebels have used surface-to-air missiles to bring down more than a dozen planes, including two transport aircraft, the U.S. Embassy in Kiev said.

Shortly after the crash, Igor Strelkov, the self-proclaimed defense minister of the Donetsk People's Republic, claimed on social media that the rebels had shot down a military transport plane. Those posts were later deleted once it turned out the plane was a civilian aircraft.

"It has the earmarks of a mistaken identification of an aircraft that they may have believed was Ukrainian," Arizona Sen. John McCain told MSNBC.

3. Why was the plane flying over a war zone?

Most airlines follow rules set by national civil aviation authorities and take the most direct route available, said Mary Schiavo, a former inspector general of the U.S. Department of Transportation.

The Malaysia Airlines flight left Amsterdam for Kuala Lumpur. It flew over eastern Ukraine, which is a common route for international carriers.

Last week, Eurocontrol, the agency responsible for coordinating European airspace, said Ukrainian authorities had closed airspace in the region below 32,000 feet, but it was open at the level Flight 17 was flying (33,000 feet).

"There's a lot of questions to be asked in a lot of different places," CNN aviation analyst Miles O'Brien said. "Why didn't government officials close off that airspace completely? 32,000 feet, that's a completely arbitrary number."

4. When will international investigators get access to the crash site?

No one knows.

A U.N. Security Council meeting ended early Monday morning, with Australia introducing a resolution that called for a swift international investigation.

"There's no doubt that at the moment the site is under the control of the Russian-backed rebels. And given the almost certain culpability of the Russian-backed rebels in the downing of the aircraft, having those people in control of the site is a little like leaving criminals in control of a crime scene," Australia's Prime Minister Tony Abbott said Monday.

But Russia, which has veto power as permanent member of the council, wants a modified resolution -- one that leaves out Ukraine from any investigation.

5. Where are the so-called black boxes?

The rebels say they have recovered something, but can't be certain those are the flight data and cockpit voice recorders.

"These are some technical objects. We cannot say for sure these are black boxes," rebel leader Alex Borodai told CNN.

Finding the devices is crucial; they will offer vital clues to the plane's last moments.

What happens to the black boxes is also unclear.

In audio intercepts released by the Ukrainian government, a rebel leader is heard saying that Moscow is very interested in the black boxes and urges his followers to look for them urgently. (CNN can't vouch for the authenticity of the audio).

6. Have all the victims' bodies been recovered?

There's no way to tell.

Rebels are keeping most of the bodies in two refrigerated train cars about 10 miles away from the site. And while international observers confirmed they saw "dozens and dozens" of bodies in the train, there was no way to verify the total.

Who were the victims?

7. What will happen to the remains?

That, too, is mired in politics. No one yet knows when they will be identified or where they will end up.

Alex Borodai, the rebel leader, says he'd rather hand over the remains to relatives -- but only after "experts" examine them. He says he fears if the remains are turned over to Ukraine, the government would use them as evidence to blame his fighters for shooting down the plane.

"I want the bodies," Selena Fredriksz sobbed at a memorial at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport on Sunday. Her son, 23-year-old Bryce, was one of the passengers on the plane. "They can have anything, but the bodies have to come back. Take their iPhones, take their money, take everything."

8. How will Russia respond?

If an investigation concludes the plane was shot down by rebels using a Russian-supplied missile -- or, worse still, by Russians themselves -- President Vladimir Putin will have two choices. And neither, says Professor Daniel Treisman, works to his advantage.

Putin could reject the conclusions and stand by the rebels. If he does so, he risks becoming an international pariah. The West might also hit Russia with even tougher economic sanctions, enough to cripple its economy and send it into a recession.

Or, Putin could sever ties with the rebels. But that could present problems too.

"A relentless barrage of propaganda has convinced many Russians that their co-ethnics in Donetsk and Luhansk are being massacred by troops commanded by a fascist regime in Kiev," said Treisman, who teaches political science at the University of California, Los Angeles, and who authored the book, "The Return: Russia's Journey from Gorbachev to Medvedev."

"For Putin to bow to international pressure and abandon his former charges would look like cowardice."

READ: How rebels in Ukraine built up an arsenal capable of reaching the skies

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