Investigation On Missing MH370 Will Not Include Criminal Aspect - Hishammuddin

KUALA LUMPUR, April 24 (Bernama) -- The investigation on the missing Malaysia Airlines (MAS) Flight MH370 by the international investigation team will not include the criminal aspect as it is under the purview of the Royal Malaysian Police. Acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said the main purposes of the team were to evaluate, investigate and determine the actual cause of the incident, so that similar incidents could be avoided in future. He said the investigation would be carried out in accordance with the Civil Aviation Regulations 1966 and the standards set under Annex 13-Aircraft Accident and Incident Investigation, the Chicago Convention, which required each party to investigate air accidents independently with full powers in their respective countries. "The Malaysian Aviation Accident Investigation Bureau which was established in December 2011 under the Transport Ministry will act as the secretariat for this investigation team," he said at a media briefing on developments on the missing MH370 that entered day 47 Wednesday. He said the Cabinet had deliberated and approved the appointment of an international investigation team to investigate the missing jetliner and the Transport Ministry had been tasked to draft the terms of reference for the team. Flight MH370, carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew, left the KL International Airport at 12.41am on March 8 and disappeared from radar screens about an hour later while over the South China Sea. It was to have landed in Beijing at 6.30am the same day. A multinational search was mounted for the aircraft, first in the South China Sea and then, after it was learned that the plane had veered off course, along two corridors - the northern corridor stretching from the border of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan to northern Thailand and the southern corridor, from Indonesia to the southern Indian Ocean. Following an unprecedented type of analysis of satellite data, the United Kingdom satellite telecommunications company Inmarsat and the UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) concluded that Flight MH370 flew along the southern corridor and that its last position was in the middle of the Indian Ocean, west of Perth, Australia. Prime Minister Najib Razak then announced on March 24, seventeen days after the disappearance of the Boeing 777-200 aircraft, that flight MH370 "ended in the southern Indian Ocean". The search continues there. Elaborating, Hishammuddin who is also Defence Minister, said the investigation team would include three groups, one of which was the airworthiness group, to look into issues such as maintenance records, structures and systems of the jetliner. "The team will also include an operational group to examine the flight recorders, operations and meteorology during the incident. "The third is the medical and human factor group, to investigate issues such as psychology, pathology and survival factors of the passengers and crew," he said. Hishammuddin said Malaysia was also discussing to appoint experts from other Asean countries in accordance with the block Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Cooperation Relating to Aircraft Accident and Incident Investigation that was signed in 2008. "We are in the process of identifying the members and the accreditated representatives and will be recruiting the members for the team in accordance with international standards. We will announce the names of the members next week," he said. Asked on what kind of expertise Malaysia was looking at from their counterparts in Asean, Hishammuddin said: "One example would be...we're trying to negotiate with Singapore from their Silk Air experience. "...and that is the sort of approach that I feel will make the panel more credible, more transparent and more effective." Hishammuddin stressed that it was imperative for the government to form an independent team of investigators which was not only competent and transparent but also highly credible. "As I have consistently said since the beginning, we have nothing to hide," he said. On the content of the memorandum of understanding with the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC), Hishammuddin said it regarded the timeline, regrouping as well as re-strategising the search operation in the southern Indian Ocean. "It doesn't say about stopping the search at all but focusing, for example, on the visual air surface, whether it is still relevant when relating to the debris or the underwater search," he said. -- BERNAMA