KIEV officials pointed the finger at pro-Russian forces this evening for shooting down a Malaysian Airlines passenger plane over eastern Ukraine, with 295 people on board.

Interior Ministry adviser Anton Gerashenko said that the plane had been flying at an altitude of 33,000 feet when it was hit by a missile fired from a Buk launcher.

The Buk missile system can fire missiles up to an altitude of 72,000 feet.

Malaysia Airlines said on its Twitter feed that it “has lost contact of MH17 from Amsterdam. The last-known position was over Ukrainian airspace. More details to follow.”

President Petro Poroshenko said: “We do not exclude that this plane was shot down and we stress that the armed forces of Ukraine did not take action against any airborne targets.”

A Ukrainian Sukhoi-25 fighter jet was shot down on Wednesday evening and was claimed by anti-Kiev rebels.

However Ukrainian Security Council spokesman Andrei Lysenko said that the Sukhoi-25 had been shot down by an air-to-air missile fired from a Russian plane.

It followed allegations by Kiev that its forces have been fired upon by missiles from a village inside Russia.

Ukraine’s consistent line is that Moscow is directly supporting the separatist fighters in the east of the country, who have been seen to have substantial quantities of powerful weaponry in recent weeks.

Ukrainian Security Service chief Valentyn Nalyvaichenko claimed earlier this week that he had “unconditional evidence” that Russia was involved in downing a military transport plane that was shot down on Monday, but aviation experts have expressed doubts over his suppositions.

Although the rebels fighting the government in Kiev suffered a major setback earlier this month when they abandoned their stronghold in the city of Sloviansk, they still appear well-supplied militarily and have inflicted heavy losses on government troops.

An Associated Press reporter said yesterday that he had seen seven rebel-owned tanks parked at a petrol station outside the eastern Ukrainian town of Snizhne. He had also observed a Buk missile.

Ukraine’s border service claimed yesterday to have evidence of five Grad multiple-rocket launchers and two armoured personnel carriers having been brought across the border on Wednesday.