Angry relatives of passengers of the the missing Malaysian Airlines flight have accused that the Malaysian government is trying to delay, distort and hide the truth regarding the fate of the plane that went down in southern Indian ocean earlier this month.
17 days after the Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 went missing on a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak announced on Monday that the aircraft was lost and that none of the passengers or crew on board survived.
Najib Tun Razak said the Boeing 777-200 airliner, which took off with 239 people aboard on March 8, flew along the southern corridor, and that its last position was in the middle of the Indian Ocean, west of Perth.
"This is a remote location, far from any possible landing sites. It is therefore with deep sadness and regret that I must inform you that, according to this new data, flight MH370 ended in the southern Indian Ocean," he told reporters.
But there is widespread dissatisfaction and frustration among family members and friends of the MH370 passengers as well as some aviation experts with Malaysia's official version without hard evidence, reports say.
One of the relatives, who were staying at a hotel in Chinese capital Beijing, issued a statement Tuesday denouncing the airline, saying it was "an attempt to deceive the families of the passengers and an attempt to deceive the people of the world."
Later, several family members and friends of the missing passengers marched towards the Malaysian Embassy in Beijing to protest, and to seek the truth behind the mysterious disappearance of the aircraft. Holding banners that read "Malaysia Airlines! You owe us an explanation," they chanted slogans such as "Malaysian government has cheated us."
Police prevented the protesters, who hurled water bottles at the embassy and tried to storm the building, seeking a meeting with the Malaysian Ambassador.
They said the Malaysian Airlines, the Malaysian government and the Malaysian military are "the real executioners who have killed our loved ones."
The relatives' frustration spilling over to the streets is seen as the reflection of a backlash in China over the mishandling of the crisis by the Government of Malaysia, a popular Chinese tourist destination.
Out of 239 people aboard the plane, 154 passengers were Chinese.
The Chinese Government has asked for more details of the data on which Malaysia's conclusion was based.
The Malaysian Prime Minister said on Tuesday that his government has no intention to hide information from the family members of the passengers on board missing flight MH370. He postponed official visit to UAE and Qatar to continue overseeing search for the missing jet.
Despite the two-weeks-long multinational search effort focused along the southern arc in the Indian Ocean, so far no reliable clue regarding the debris of the missing plane is known to the world.
Australian Government last week had announced the discovery of two objects seen on satellite images that could possibly be the debris of the missing Malaysian Airlines flight.
The objects were located in waters 2,500 kilometers south-west of the Australian city of Perth.
Due to poor weather, Australian authorities suspended the search for the missing flight on Tuesday.
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May 08, 2026 15:50 ET Manufacturing and services sector survey results and labor market data from main economies were the highlight on the economics news front this week. Factory orders and jobs report dominated the news flow in the U.S. Similarly, industrial production data from German garnered attention in Europe. In Asia, purchasing managers’ survey results from China and the central bank decision from Australia were in focus.