KUALA LUMPUR, March 31 — Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak will travel to Perth on Wednesday for a briefing on the ongoing search for debris from Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein said today.
The defence and acting transport minister also told a press conference at the Putra World Trade Centre (PWTC) that Najib spoke to Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott earlier today to seek an update on the efforts to locate the missing plane.
“Our prime minister has decided to travel to Perth on Wednesday for a working visit to Pearce Air Force Base to see the operations first-hand and also to thank the personnel involved in the multi-national search effort, including the Malaysian personnel,” Hishammuddin said.
Najib has stayed in the background since news of the crisis broke on the morning of March 8, except for two press conferences.
One was on March 15 to confirm that the plane, which disappeared off the coast of Kota Baru the Saturday prior, had been deliberately flown off course towards the west of Peninsula Malaysia.
His second appearance was on March 24 to announce that the missing Boeing 777-200ER “ended” its journey in the southern Indian Ocean, a location he described as remote and far from any possible landing site.
Today, Hishammuddin said he will head for the United States Pacific Command in Hawaii where an ASEAN Defence Ministers’ meeting will be held over the next three days to share the latest developments regarding the search for MH370.
“I will also use this opportunity to discuss the possibility of deploying more specific military assets, in the event that we need to embark on a more complex phase of the operation.
“I shall be discussing with the United States, and our other friends and allies, how best we can acquire the assets needed for possible deep-sea search and recovery,” he said.
The search effort is now concentrated in a section of the Indian Ocean west of Perth in Western Australia where satellite images have spotted pieces of debris possibly from MH370, although recovery could still take years even if it is established that the plane went down at that location.
