ROZSYPNE, Ukraine: Explosions rang out near the crash site of downed flight MH17 in eastern Ukraine on Thursday as international investigators arrived for the first time in nearly a week after Kiev announced a surprise one-day halt to its offensive against rebels.

A small team of Dutch and Australian experts accompanied by international monitors reached the vast site of the doomed Malaysia Airlines jet after days of fierce fighting between government forces and rebels had stopped them reaching the area.

The Dutch justice ministry said the team was so far only a “reconnaissance” mission but would hopefully pave the way for more experts to visit soon.

But in a sign of the continuing insecurity, an AFP team following some minutes behind the convoy heard loud blasts just a few kilometers away from the site and saw black smoke rising from a village close to where some of the plane wreckage is lying.

Ukraine’s military had earlier announced a “day of quiet” across the entire east after a plea from UN chief Ban Ki-moon to halt fighting in the area of the crash, where remains from some of the 298 victims lie festering in the sun some two weeks after the jet was shot down over rebel territory.

Ukraine’s Parliament rejected Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk’s resignation on Thursday and finally passed legislation he said was needed to finance an army offensive against a separatist rebellion raging in the east and avert a national default on its debts.

The assembly’s about-turn on laws it refused to back a week earlier offers relief to Kiev’s Western political and financial backers, who had feared Ukraine was sliding deeper into political chaos and might renege on the terms of an international bailout as it heads into a potentially bitter election campaign.

The political battle is taking place against the backdrop of a nearly five-month military conflict to take back parts of the Donbass region, which borders Russia, from the Moscow-backed rebels. Having recaptured the rebel stronghold of Slaviansk in early July, government forces are now moving on Donetsk and Luhansk.

In sharp contrast to the stormy parliamentary session last week at which the prime minister bellowed at legislators and accused them of betraying Ukraine’s army and people by blocking reforms, deputies stood and applauded him after backing the amendments.

“There are two pieces of news today. The first is that Argentina has defaulted, and the second is that Ukraine has not defaulted and never will,” Yatseniuk told the chamber, making clear he would stay in office.

President Petro Poroshenko said the votes in parliament would help Kiev in its fight against the separatists.

On a visit to the Netherlands, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak appealed for an “immediate cessation in and around the crash site by both Ukraine and separatist forces.” The West says the insurgents likely shot down the plane with a missile on July 17, but Russia and the rebels said it could have been blown out of sky by a Ukrainian jet.

Lawmakers in Kiev ratified agreements with The Hague and Canberra that could see the two nations send some 950 armed personnel to secure the site where many of their nationals died.

The Netherlands has already ruled out the possibility of sending in troops as “unrealistic” over fears they could become entangled in Ukraine’s murky conflict that has claimed over 1,100 lives in more than three months of bitter fighting.

Meanwhile, Russia’s aviation authorities said a team of their own experts had arrived in Kiev and were hoping to reach the crash site.