Interpol looks for answers on missing plane
INTERPOL was yesterday trying to establish the identities of at least two passengers on the missing Malaysia Airlines flight who were travelling on stolen passports.
While the police agency said it was too soon to draw conclusions, it said the use of stolen passports was “clearly of great concern”.
The passports, belonging to an Italian and an Austrian who were not on the flight, were already flagged up on Interpol’s database of stolen travel documents.
The two people who did get on the plane were booked to travel through to Amsterdam. Malaysian officials are questioning immigration staff and combing over CCTV footage to find out why no-one caught the stolen papers.
“For years Interpol has asked why should countries wait for a tragedy to put prudent security measures in place at borders and boarding gates,” said secretary general Ronald Noble.
Investigators are also working through the entire passenger manifest for clues about the fate of the flight, which remained unclear last night.
Reports of wreckage in the sea off Vietnam were unverified as night fell on the area around the flight path, where an oil slick had been spotted earlier in the day.
One person involved in investigating the disappearance said that the Boeing 777-200 may have disintegrated in mid-air, a possible explanation for the lack of mayday call. The source said there was no evidence yet of foul play and that the aircraft could have broken up due to mechanical causes.
Families of the 227 passengers and 12 crew on board Flight MH370 have been gathering in Beijing to await more details following the disappearance of the plane on Friday evening.
Malaysia Airlines, majority-owned by the country’s sovereign wealth fund Khazanah, said yesterday it was “fearing for the worst”.
The airline carried 17.2m passengers last year and made net losses of 1.17bn Malaysian ringgit (£215m).