Malaysia Set To Release Initial Report Into MH370 Disappearance

[May 01, 2014]  By Siva Govindasamy

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) — Malaysia is expected to release a report on Thursday on the missing Malaysia Airlines plane that it has sent to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the UN body that governs global aviation.

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak told CNN last week that the report on Flight MH370 would be released this week, and the Ministry of Transport said in a statement that a media release and preliminary report would be issued later on Thursday.

Malaysian officials declined to comment on what the report might contain.

The fact that the aircraft has not yet been found suggests there will be few, if any, major revelations in the report, although any information on the missing flight is being closely followed by families of missing passengers and international media.

The Boeing 777-200ER, which had 239 passengers and crew on board, disappeared off civilian radars on March 8 while on a scheduled flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

Relatives of those on board have accused the Malaysian government of bungling the early phase of the search and of keeping them in the dark about the details of the incident.

The search moved to the Straits of Malacca a week after the disappearance after radar data confirmed that the aircraft made a turn back. It was expanded after satellite data showed it could have taken a course anywhere from central Asia to the southern Indian Ocean.

Satellite data eventually showed that the aircraft flew to the southern section of the Indian Ocean, off the coast of western Australia, where a massive search of the waters and underwater has still not yielded any evidence of the aircraft.

(Reporting by Siva Govindasamy; editing by Mike Collett-White)

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