Malaysia to host meet to review MH370 probe

TIL Desk/World/Kuala Lumpur-Malaysia today said it will host a two-day meeting with Australia and China to chart out the “future direction” of the search operation for flight MH370 which went missing over two years ago and believed to have crashed into the Indian Ocean with 239 people onboard. Deputy Transport Minister Ab Aziz Kaprawi told that the meeting would also look at in detail, other issues, including the recent discovery of debris of the Malaysia Airlines plane found thousands of kilometres from the suspected crash area in the southern Indian Ocean.

The meeting, involving officials from Australia, China and Malaysia is expected to take place at the transport ministry office beginning from tomorrow. “Top of the agenda of the meeting is on the future direction of the search operation for MH370. Only high ranking officials will attend the meeting. Malaysia will be represented by Department of Civil Aviation director-general Azharuddin Abdul Rahman,” Ab Aziz said. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB), which leads the multi-nation search in the Indian Ocean, is expected to complete searching the designated 120,000 sq km of the sea by end of this month.

Australia, China and Malaysia have said previously they will call off the search for the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 if nothing is found in a designated search area in the remote Indian Ocean. So far 105,000 square kilometres of the 120,000-square- kilometre seafloor search zone has been covered without success. Several pieces of debris found thousands of kilometres from the suspected crash area have so far shed no light on the cause of the disaster. The Beijing-bound MH370 aircraft with 239 passengers and crew on board disappeared from civilian radar screens on March 8, 2014 and its flight path is believed to have ended in the southern Indian Ocean. There were five Indians onboard the plane.