KUALA LUMPUR
Malaysia’s prime minister assured Sunday of the country’s commitment to search for Malaysia Airline Flight MH370, as the families of the 239 people on board marked the anniversary of the plane’s disappearance.
In a statement, Najib Razak expressed his sorrow over the tragedy that shook the world on May 8, 2014 when the Beijing-bound flight disappeared from radars – with no trace being found despite an extensive one-year international search.
"Today, we stand united in remembering and honoring the 239 people, including 50 Malaysians who were onboard MH370,” Najib said. “Our prayers are with them and their loved ones left behind - whose sorrow we share.”
While vowing to continue the search, he expressed hope that the ill-fated flight would be found as the government was doing all it could with the assistance of other countries, including Australia and China.
He described the case as without precedent and involving “the most complex and technically challenging [search] in aviation history.”
He added: “No words can describe the pain the families of those on board are going through. The lack of answers and definitive proof – such as aircraft wreckage – has made this more difficult to bear."
Gatherings for mourning family members were held across capital Kuala Lumpur and its suburbs, including candlelight vigils on the eve of the anniversary and a Day of Remembrance organized at a mall by a support group called Voice 370.
The troubled Malaysia Airlines also held a ceremony at its academy with the attendance of around 600 people in remembrance of 12 crew members on board MH370.
The Malaysia Insider website reported that the relatives at the event included those of MH370 pilot Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah.
The airline’s outgoing chief executive, Ahmad Jauhari Yahya, paid tribute to the employees for their dedication and support.
“Watching how the whole organization came together, united, supported each other as a family in crisis, really amazed me,” the website quoted him as saying. “I am deeply honored and touched by the spirit of volunteerism by everyone who came forward offering to help in any way you could."
The International Civil Aviation Organization had marked the anniversary by extending its sympathies to the families of those on board, and its support to all parties involved in search operations.
It released a statement saying that 2014 had represented one of aviation's safest years due to the low number of accidents recorded, despite tragedies such as Flight MH370 and the downing of Malaysia Airline Flight MH17 in n Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region four months later.
The ill-fated flights had revealed some important gaps that may arise under rare circumstances, which the aviation community would work to address, according to the statement.
It explained that a working group established immediately after MH370's disappearance was working on developing a distress and safety system, involving a 15-minute tracking objective for normal flight operations and a one-minute distress and abnormal flight tracking requirement.
The governments of China and Australia also reiterated their commitment Sunday to continue search efforts in the southern Indian Ocean where the plane is thought to have went missing.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told a press conference, "We will provide all necessary assistance and services to each family of those onboard the plane."
Meanwhile, Australia’s deputy prime minister Warren Truss was quoted by Sky News as saying: “Having spent time with the Australian families over the past few days, I share their sense of helplessness at not knowing what happened to the aircraft.”
The victims’ families have been expressing concerns over a possible down-scaling of search efforts since late January, when Malaysia declared the flight lost in an accident, with all aboard presumed dead.
A year of searching the Indian Ocean, where the Boeing 777 is believed to have crashed, has not resulted in any positive indication of what happened to the plane or those on board.
According to the working theory undersea efforts are based on, the flight is believed to have flown south before crashing in a remote and stormy section of the Indian Ocean. The theory relies on calculations based on satellite data of transmissions with the plane.
Ongoing search operations, which had included around 160 ships and aircraft with experts from 25 countries providing advice, have covered around 26,000 square kilometers, or 44 percent of the designated area of the southern Indian Ocean.
Later on Sunday, an international team is expected to release an interim report into why the flight abandoned its trajectory and disappeared from radars an hour after takeoff.
