MH370 The initiative by Chinese family members of the missing Flight MH370 passengers to search for the missing plane themselves has been welcomed by Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) chief Azharuddin Abdul Rahman.

Answering a reporter's question today, Azharuddin ( left ) even invited the family members to share their findings with the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC) to further aid the search.

"We heard it too, (about the family's initiative). We leave it to them. They can do so and hopefully, they can share their outcome with the JACC," he told a press conference at the Royale Chulan Hotel in Kuala Lumpur today.

Meeting with PM is on

The request by families of the passengers of missing Malaysia Airlines (MAS) Flight MH370 to meet Prime Minister Najib Razak and Acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Tun Hussein will be fulfilled in the near future reports Bernama .

This was said by Communication and Multimedia Deputy Minister Jailani Johari today at the press briefing. 

           

He added Malaysia is looking forward to establish a working template in dealing with issues raised by next-of-kin of the passengers of the ill-fated plane.

"We will continue our direct engagement efforts with the next-of-kin primarily in Malaysia and China. We would also like to praise the Chinese government's efforts in handling the issues related to the families.        

Jailani noted that Deputy Foreign Minister Hamzah Zainuddin ( right ), who leads the committee to liaise with the next-of-kin, will be heading to Beijing in due time to to update the Chinese counterparts on the latest efforts at the tripartite level and Malaysia's contribution.                           

"We would also be discussing with the Chinese leadership on their views and future plans with regards to the MH370 search operation, ranging from issues related to the families, asset deployment and technical expertise"

      

More information

Meanwhile on the four sub committees' trip to Canberra, Australia, tomorrow, Azharuddin said the objective of the trip among others was to get more information on the completed re-analysis of the raw data and the results of the bathymetric survey analysis.   

             

The four sub committees comprise of the asset deployment committee, technical and logistics committee, next-of-kin committee, and the liaison, communication and media committee.                                             

"Experts in Australia, comprising Australian and Malaysian teams in Canberra, have done their analysis and they are now in the process of exchanging notes with Inmarsat," he said.

        

He, however, said that the outcome of the discussions between the team of experts and Inmarsat cannot be revealed until more details of the progress was  obtained.    

      

"On the bathymetric survey, so far the analysis of the survey is being done by Geoscience Australia. Again, this is another objective of us going to Canberra and we should be able to know the results of this initial bathymetric survey," he added.

             

Head of the Asset Committee, Rahim Bakri, said Petronas and DRB-HICOM Defence Technologies Sdn Bhd (Deftech) had already formed a partnership and they were offering certain assets to be deployed in the search area soon.  

   

"On the cost involved (search operation for the next phase), after finalising it in the next few months, the cost can be determined and will be shared 50-50 by Malaysia and Australia," he said.   

 

On the the crowd funding initiative by the families to raise US$5 million (RM16.1 million) to reward whistleblowers for information regarding the plane's location, Azharuddin said they came to know about this through the newspapers and welcomed the initiative.

Oil, food in MH370 search cost Malaysia RM27.6mil