Malaysia missing airline: Air probe finds scant evidence of attack

March 11, 2014

Malaysia_missing_airlineKuala Lumpur/Washington, Mar 11: Investigators in Malaysia are voicing skepticism that the airliner that disappeared early Saturday with 239 people on board was the target of an attack, US and European government sources close to the probe said.

The fate of the Malaysian airliner that vanished about an hour into a flight to Beijing remained a mystery, as a massive air and sea search, now in its third day, failed to turn up any trace of the Boeing 777 plane.

Neither Malaysia's Special Branch, the agency leading the investigation locally, nor spy agencies in the United States and Europe have ruled out the possibility that militants may have been involved in downing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370.

But Malaysian authorities have indicated that the evidence so far does not strongly back an attack as a cause for the aircraft's disappearance, and that mechanical or pilot problems could have led to the apparent crash, the US sources said.

"There is no evidence to suggest an act of terror," said a European security source, who added that there was also "no explanation what's happened to it or where it is."

Meanwhile, dozens of ships and aircraft from 10 countries were still scouring the seas around Malaysia and south of Vietnam as questions mounted over possible security lapses that could have led to a downing of the Boeing 777-200ER after it climbed to an altitude of 35,000 feet (10,670 meters).

Interpol confirmed on Sunday at least two passengers used stolen passports and said it was checking whether others aboard had used false identity documents.

Even so, one U.S. source said Malaysian authorities were leaning away from the theory that the plane was attacked. Their view was mostly based on electronic evidence that indicates the flight may have turned back toward the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur before disappearing.

Even that information has not been clearly confirmed, and investigators and intelligence sources say the fate of the Flight MH370 is still shrouded in mystery.

One reason was that the aircraft had failed to make automatic contact with a flight data-monitoring system after vanishing from radar screens, two people familiar with the matter said on Monday. Such contact could have helped investigators determine what happened.

The aircraft was equipped with a maintenance computer capable of talking to the ground automatically through short messages known as ACARS. "There were no signals from ACARS from the time the aircraft disappeared," a source involved in the investigations said.

Also raising doubts about the possibility of an attack, the United States extensively reviewed imagery taken by spy satellites for evidence of a mid-air explosion, but saw none, a U.S. government source said. The source described US satellite coverage of the region as thorough.

With no success so far, authorities were planning to widen the search from Tuesday, Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, the head of Malaysia's Civil Aviation Authority, told reporters on Monday.

"Unfortunately we have not found anything that appears to be objects from the aircraft, let alone the aircraft," he said. "As far as we are concerned, we have to find the aircraft. We have to find a piece of the aircraft if possible."

Azharuddin said a hijacking attempt could not be ruled out as investigators explore all theories.

A senior police official told Reuters that people armed with explosives and carrying false identity papers had tried to fly out of Kuala Lumpur in the past, and that current investigations were focused on two passengers who were on the missing plane with stolen passports.

"We have stopped men with false or stolen passports and carrying explosives, who have tried to get past KLIA (airport) security and get on to a plane," he said. "There have been two or three incidents, but I will not divulge the details."

Azharuddin also said the two men with stolen passports did not look like Asians, but he did not elaborate. Airport CCTV footage showed they completed all security procedures, he said.

"We are looking at the possibility of a stolen passport syndicate," he said.

About two-thirds of the 227 passengers and 12 crew now presumed to have died aboard the plane were Chinese. The airline said other nationalities included 38 Malaysians, seven Indonesians, six Australians, five Indians, four French and three Americans.

A senior source involved in preliminary investigations in Malaysia said the failure to find any debris indicated the plane may have broken up mid-flight, which could disperse wreckage over a very wide area.

"The fact that we are unable to find any debris so far appears to indicate that the aircraft is likely to have disintegrated at around 35,000 feet," said the source.

Asked about the possibility of an explosion, the source said there was no evidence of foul play and that the aircraft could have broken up due to mechanical causes.

Still, the source said the closest parallels were the bomb explosions on board an Air India jetliner in 1985 when it was over the Atlantic Ocean and a Pan Am aircraft over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988. Both planes were cruising at around 31,000 feet at the time.

Underlining the lack of hard information about the Malaysian plane's fate, a U.S. Navy P-3 aircraft capable of covering 1,500 square miles (3,900 square km) every hour was sweeping the northern part of the Strait of Malacca, on the other side of the Malaysian peninsula from where the last contact with MH370 was made.

No distress signal was sent from the lost plane, which experts said suggested a sudden catastrophic failure or explosion, but Malaysia's air force chief said radar tracking showed it may have turned back from its scheduled route before it disappeared.

Superior safety record

The Boeing 777 has one of the best safety records of any commercial aircraft in service. Its only previous fatal crash came on July 6 last year when Asiana Airlines Flight 214 struck a seawall on landing in San Francisco, killing three people.

US planemaker Boeing declined to comment.

The passenger manifest issued by the airline included the names of two Europeans who were not on the plane. Their passports had been stolen in Thailand during the past two years.

An Interpol spokeswoman said a check of all documents used to board the plane had revealed more "suspect passports", which were being investigated.

"Whilst it is too soon to speculate about any connection between these stolen passports and the missing plane, it is clearly of great concern that any passenger was able to board an international flight using a stolen passport listed in Interpol's databases," Interpol Secretary General Ronald Noble said.

A Thai travel agent who arranged the tickets for the two passengers using the stolen passports said she had booked them on the flight via Beijing because they were the cheapest tickets, the Financial Times reported.

The travel agent in the resort of Pattaya said an Iranian business contact she knew only as "Mr. Ali" had asked her to book tickets for the two men on March 1.

She had initially booked them on other airlines but those reservations expired and on March 6, Mr. Ali had asked her to book them again. She told the newspaper she did not think Mr. Ali, who paid her in cash and booked tickets with her regularly, was linked to terrorism.

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News Network
July 11,2020

Geneva, Jul 11: The World Health Organization said Friday that it is still possible to bring coronavirus outbreaks under control, even though case numbers have more than doubled in the past six weeks.

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the examples of Italy, Spain, South Korea and India's biggest slum showed that however bad a outbreak was, the virus could still be reined in through aggressive action.

"In the last six weeks cases have more than doubled," Tedros told a virtual press conference in Geneva.

However, "there are many examples from around the world that have shown that even if the outbreak is very intense, it can still be brought back under control," said Tedros.

"And some of these examples are Italy, Spain and South Korea, and even in Dharavi -- a densely packed area in the megacity of Mumbai -- a strong focus on community engagement and the basics of testing, tracing, isolating and treating all those that are sick is key to breaking the chains of transmission and suppressing the virus."

The novel coronavirus has killed at least 555,000 people worldwide since the outbreak emerged in China last December, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP on Friday.

Nearly 12.3 million cases have been registered in 196 countries and territories.

"Across all walks of life, we are all being tested to the limit," Tedros said, "from countries where there is exponential growth, to places that are loosening restrictions and now starting to see cases rise.

"Only aggressive action combined with national unity and global solidarity can turn this pandemic around."

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News Network
June 5,2020

Karachi, Jun 5: Pakistan's coronavirus cases rose to 89,249 on Friday after a record 4,896 new infections were detected in the country, while the death toll due to COVID-19 has reached 1,838, according to the health ministry.

The Ministry of National Health Service said that 68 patients died in the last 24 hours, taking the death toll to 1,838, whereas another 31,198 people have recovered.

It was the third consecutive day when a record number of cases were reported in Pakistan after the Eid holidays and easing of lockdown restrictions at the end of May.

Sindh province reported 33,536 infections, Punjab 33,144, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa 11,890, Balochistan 5,582, Islamabad 3,946, Gilgit-Baltistan 852 and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir 299.

The authorities have conducted 638,323 tests, including a record 22,812 tests in the last 24 hours, the ministry said.

Despite the spike in number of COVID-19 cases, both houses of parliament are scheduled to meet separately on Friday. The Senate session started this morning while the National Assembly will be held in the afternoon, Radio Pakistan reported.

Chairman Senate Sadiq Sanjrani and Speaker National Assembly Asad Qaiser at a meeting at the parliament house in Islamabad reviewed arrangements made for the two sessions.

Fumigation was also carried out in the parliament house for the safety of the lawmakers and staff.

Earlier, the Opposition rejected the idea of virtual meetings and insisted that the sessions be held in person, noting that it was an important session of parliament because the budget is expected to be presented in the National Assembly in the next week.

The novel coronavirus which first originated from China's Wuhan city in December last year has claimed 391,249 lives and has infected over 6 million people globally, according to Johns Hopkins University data.

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News Network
June 13,2020

Shanghai, Jun 13: Authorities in Beijing have temporarily shut a major wholesale agricultural market following a rise in locally transmitted novel coronavirus infections in China's capital city over the past two days.

The closure of the Xinfadi wholesale market at 3 a.m. local time on Saturday (1900 GMT on Friday), came after two men working at a meat research centre who had recently visited the market were reported on Friday as having been infected by the novel coronavirus. It was not immediately clear how the men had been infected.

Concern is growing of a second wave of the new virus, even in many countries that seemed to have curbed its spread. It was first reported at a seafood market in Wuhan, the capital of central China's Hubei province, in December.

Beijing authorities had earlier halted beef and mutton trading at the Xinfadi market, alongside closures at other wholesale markets around the city.

Reflecting concerns over the risk of further spread of the virus, major supermarkets in Beijing removed salmon from their shelves overnight after the virus causing COVID-19 was discovered on chopping boards used for imported salmon at the market, the state-owned Beijing Youth Daily reported.

Beijing authorities said more than 10,000 people at the market will take nucleic acid tests to detect coronavirus infections. The city government also said it had dropped plans to reopen schools on Monday for students in grades one through three because of the new cases.

Health authorities visited the home of a Reuters reporter in Beijing's Dongcheng district on Saturday to ask whether she had visited the Xinfadi market, which is 15 km (9 miles) away. They said the visit was part of patrols Dongcheng was conducting.

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China reported 11 new COVID-19 cases and seven asymptomatic cases for Friday, the national health authority said on Saturday. And all six locally transmitted cases were confirmed in Beijing.

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