ICAO cooperates with Malaysia on MAS tragedies - Secretary-General

The International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) has been cooperating with the Malaysian Government to work on issues concerning the two Malaysia Airlines (MAS) aircraft tragedies this year, said ICAO Secretary-General Raymond Benjamin.

He said the two main issues that ICAO was working on were establishing a global tracking system and flight over conflict zone.

"Ukraine is a conflict zone and there are other conflict zones also. ICAO is cooperating very thoroughly with the Malaysian Government on this matter.

"Malaysia will be an important delegation to the international ICAO conference in Montreal in February next year. More than 150 countries will attend the conference," he said when met at the KLIA Awards 2013 dinner here Friday.

Benjamin added that ICAO also made an unanimous resolution on the need to access the crash sites of MAS Flight MH17 which was shot down over Ukraine on July 17.

Meanwhile, Deputy Transport Minister Datuk Abdul Aziz Kaprawi, in his speech on behalf of the minister, Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai, assured the government would seek closure for all families and friends of victims lost in the MAS tragedies.

"On behalf of the government, I would like to assure that we will not slow down our search or spare any effort, and will continue to explore all possible options in locating Flight MH370, and finding out what really happened in the MH17 incident.

Flight MH17, with 298 passengers and crew on board, was on its way from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur when it was downed in Donetsk, eastern Ukraine on July 17.

The Boeing 777-200ER aircraft is believed to have been shot down by a missile but no party has claimed responsibility. Forty-three people, comprising passengers and crew, are Malaysians.

Flight MH370 with 239 people onboard was en route to Beijing when it vanished about an hour after take-off from the KL International Airport on March 8.