Cosgrove passes on condolences to the families

SIR Peter Cosgrove said he had begun contacting the “brave but devastated’’ families of the victims of MH17.

Peter Cosgrove and wife Lynne place a wreath at the MH17 memorial at Schiphol airport. Picture: Rupert Hartley

Peter Cosgrove said he had begun contacting the “brave but devastated’’ families of the victims of MH17 to express the condol­ences of the Australian people.

The Governor-General laid a wreath at the makeshift memorial at Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport, adding a touch of wattle and gum leaves to the thick blanket of children’s drawings, teddy bears, candles and sweet-smelling flowers.

Spontaneously he hugged two young Dutch boys from Utrecht in the south of the country who were among the hundreds at the memorial to pay their respects and sign the condolence book.

Sir Peter told the Bijmar boys, Ruben, 10, and Sam, 6, they were now part-Australian as he handed them some wattle sprigs and ­invited them to visit.

“I know about kangaroos,’’ Ruben said.

Sir Peter said it was important to thank the Dutch people for their moving ceremony on Wednesday and continuing each afternoon when each of the waves of bodies has been transported from Ukraine to The Netherlands.

Sir Peter said he had started to contact the Australian families to tell them of the dignified event.

“That was such a moving ceremony (on Wednesday) that afterwards I started to phone the relatives, the loved ones of those Australians and those other folk who were living permanently in Australia,’’ he said.

“I started to phone them to tell them what a beautifully conducted, dignified and affectionate ceremony had been held — not just there at Eindhoven but the ­corteges were travelling along highways and byways.

“I wanted to tell them that in amongst that unknown group of victims who returned ... then it didn’t matter who they were, the Dutch were mourning them along with everyone else.”

Another 74 victims returned yesterday and 74 were due ­overnight. It is expected all of the remains of 203 victims that were transported by train from the crash site near Torez to Kharkiv will have arrived at the military base in Hilversum for forensic analysis by the end of the ­weekend.

Sir Peter said the families were braced for a long identification process.

‘‘They have all been tremendous on the telephone, very brave, receiving great support, but they are devastated,’’ he said.

He said the families wanted to convey their thanks to the Dutch government for according the bodies the respect and dignity that had been denied them in the taking of their lives.

Sir Peter visited Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte yesterday to pass on the messages.

“I was happy to do that, and I know the Dutch Prime Minister speaks frequently with our Prime Minister, but I wanted to say to him face to face on behalf of all Australians we feel joined to the people of The Netherlands in this tragedy.’’