Flight MH370: No new clues in interim report

AN interim report into Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, published on the first anniversary of its disappearance, has given no new clues as to what happened to the plane.

The report revealed that an underwater locator beacon battery had expired a year earlier, although it is unclear whether this impacted the search.

The airliner was flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing when it vanished. Malaysia and Australia say they remain committed to finding the missing plane.

Relatives of the 239 passengers and crew held remembrance ceremonies on Sunday.

The Malaysian government report contains masses of technical information about the missing aircraft, its maintenance record, the background of the crew, and the various air traffic control and military radar tracking records of the plane, says the BBC’s Jonathan Head.

It notes the battery on the beacon of the flight data recorder had expired, which may suggest searchers had less chance of locating the aircraft, although the battery on the locator beacon of the cockpit voice recorder was working.

But the report offers no significant new information which might explain where the plane went, or what happened to it, adds our correspondent.

Search teams are looking for the plane in a 60,000 sq km zone in the southern Indian Ocean.

Australia’s Prime Minister Tony Abbott said the search would move to a different area if the current operation was unsuccessful, as long as there were reasonable leads.