Opposition Leader Bill Shorten says Vladimir Putin should "show enough conscience" not to come to Australia for next month's G20 summit, accusing the Russian President of "rubbing our faces" in the aftermath of MH17 by making the trip.
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Mr Shorten on Monday scaled up his criticism of Mr Putin, whose attendance at the economic forum in Brisbane was confirmed by the government on Sunday.
Speaking to reporters in Melbourne, Mr Shorten said he understood the government could not act unilaterally to prevent Mr Putin from attending an international conference.
But he said he believed most Australians would not welcome the Russian President's visit and "laying out the red carpet" was not the way to "deal with an international bully".
"There's plenty of evidence to indicate indirect if not direct Russian involvement in the shooting down of this plane which saw hundreds of souls snatched away from their families, with no justification or rationale," Mr Shorten said.
"How is it that the President of the Russian Federation Putin will thumb his nose at the rest of the world, go wherever he wants without there being any repercussions or any cooperation with the independent investigation as to how this happened?
"I believe Putin knows more about what happened with MH17 than he's let on."
Mr Shorten added that he would not meet with the Russian leader while he was in Australia.
He said it would be to Prime Minister Tony Abbott's credit if something came from talks with Mr Putin while he was in Australia that assisted the investigation into the downing of MH17.
"I wish that Putin would at least show enough conscience to be able to not come to Australia because he's rubbing our faces in it," Mr Shorten said.
But not all MPs have reacted so strongly to news of Mr Putin's visit.
Liberal Party backbencher Andrew Laming said the criticism of Mr Putin was "counter constructive".
"I think all of the leaders of the G20 should be welcome regardless of our individual views about what individual nations stand for or have done," he told Fairfax Media.
He said the point of the G20 forum was to bring leaders together to discuss shared concerns about their economies.
"It's size of your economy and secondly I don't think anyone's been found guilty of any particular episode," Mr Laming said.
"It's still under investigation and parties should remain innocent until proven guilty.
"So we'll wait to see the report when it's brought down and who is found to be guilty but in the meantime we have 20 world leaders that I think should be welcome in Australia."
Mr Abbott said on Sunday it was not in Australia's power to go against a consensus of the G20's members and ban an individual leader from attending, after Treasurer Joe Hockey confirmed on the ABC's Insiders program that Mr Putin would be present.
He acknowledged that some Australians would be angry to see him shake the Russian leader's hand but said he would be seeking an "assurance from him that he and Russia will do everything they can to ensure that now, at least, justice is done".
