Dutch foreign minister Frans Timmermans and his Australian counterpart Julie Bishop are back in Ukraine on Monday in an effort to win access to the crash site of flight MH17.

The aim is to persuade the Ukrainian parliament to allow a large police mission to the region, Nos television reports. The Ukrainian parliament is due to discuss the situation on Thursday but Bishop told Australian paper Herald Sun this is too late.

The Netherlands and Australia are putting together a large team of police, military police and forensic experts to go to the region to bring out the remaining bodies and then to determine the cause of the crash.

However, those already in Ukraine have been unable to visit the crash site so far because of fighting between pro-Russian rebels and Ukrainian forces.

Progress

Neveretheless, the accident investigators already in Ukraine have been able to make good progress without visiting the area, spokesman Wim van der Weegen told the Volkskrant.

The team has so far been focusing on the flight details, radar and satellite information, air traffic control and the black boxes, the paper says.