Pro-Russian fighters waved a white flag on Wednesday to start a handover of the bodies of Ukrainian troops killed in a plane shot down near Luhansk, at a check point in the village of Karlivka near Donetsk, eastern Ukraine.
The two sides managed to arrange a brief truce Wednesday evening to allow pro-Russian forces to hand over the bodies of 49 Ukrainian troops who died when the separatists shot down a transport plane bound for the airport in Luhansk last weekend.
Heavy fighting raged on Thursday morning, after rebels rejected a call to lay down their arms in line with a peace plan proposed by President Petro Poroshenko.
