MH370 wreckage likely to be found in Australian search area: FM

Australia's Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has expressed growing confidence that the wreckage from missing Malaysia Airlines flight 370 will be found in Australia's search zone in the southern Indian Ocean. Speaking to the Nine Network on Friday, Julie Bishop said this week's news of debris washing up on Reunion Island off the east coast of Africa pointed to the wreckage being somewhere within the 120,000 square kilometer search area off the west coast of Australia. "We at least seem to have some evidence that flight MH370 will be found, particularly in the search area that (Australia) has been focusing on," she said. Bishop said Australia has an important role in finding the jet, not only to provide closure to the families of those missing, but also to reinstate faith in civil aviation to those who travel frequently. "We believe it is important for international civil aviation, generally, for us to determine what happened for this flight, as well as provide the opportunity for families of those on board to have some closure," she said. MH370 went missing on March 8 last year with 239 people on board, most of them Chinese nationals. Bishop said she met with her Chinese counterpart Wang Yi this week to discuss the search effort. She said China is continuing to playing a key role in the search for the missing Boeing 777 but, now that more debris has been found, has urged the Asian nations, China and Malaysia, to join Australia in ramping up the efforts. "I met with the Chinese foreign minister and we discussed the search effort for MH370," Bishop said. "Currently, China has been contributing resources, and we have been working closely with Malaysia and China to continue that search effort. There will be a reckoning of costs in due course. "At present our focus is ascertaining the whereabouts of MH370. " Bishop said Australia had pledged another 40 million US dollars to the search, but calculating who was contributing what to the hunt was not the pertinent issue. "This is one of the great aviation mysteries of our time, and for the purpose of safety, security, faith and trust in the civil aviation system, we must do what we can to find MH370," she told the Nine Network. "Of course we owe it to the families of those on board to do it as well."