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| Malaysian PM says lost airliner was diverted deliberately Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 09:02 PM PDT  By Anshuman Daga and Siva Govindasamy KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - A missing Malaysian airliner appears to have been deliberately steered off course after someone on board shut down its communications, Prime Minister Najib Razak said on Saturday. But the new satellite data gave no precise location, and the plane's altered course could have taken it anywhere from central Asia to the southern Indian Ocean, he said. The Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200ER vanished en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in the early hours of March 8 with 239 passengers and crew aboard. "Despite media reports the plane was hijacked, I wish to be very clear, we are still investigating all possibilities as to what caused MH370 to deviate." Search operations by navies and aircraft from more than a dozen nations were immediately called off in the Gulf of Thailand and the South China Sea to the east of Malaysia, where the plane dropped off civilian air traffic control screens at 1:22 a.m. last Saturday (1722 GMT on Friday). Full Story | Top |
| Indian Ocean poses daunting challenge in search for missing Malaysia plane Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 08:12 PM PDT  By Jane Wardell SYDNEY (Reuters) - The southern Indian Ocean, where investigators suspect missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 may have come down, is one place where a commercial airliner can crash without a ship spotting it, a radar plotting it or even a satellite picking it up. Even Australia, which has island territories in the Indian Ocean and sends rescue planes to pluck stricken yachtsmen from the cold, mountainous seas in the south from time to time, has no radar coverage much beyond its Indian Ocean coast. "In most of Western Australia and almost all of the Indian Ocean, there is almost no radar coverage," an Australian civil aviation authority source said, requesting anonymity as he was not authorized to speak on the record. "If anything is more than 100 kilometers offshore, you don't see it." The Indian Ocean, the world's third largest, has an average depth of more than 12,000 feet, or two miles. Full Story | Top |
| India puts on hold search for missing plane: officials Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 08:07 PM PDT India on Sunday put on hold its search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, at the request of the government in Kuala Lumpur, which wants to reassess the week-old hunt for the Boeing 777 that is suspected of being deliberately flown off course. India had been combing two areas, one around the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, and a second, further west, in the Bay of Bengal. "It's more of a pause," said Commander Babu, a spokesman for the country's Eastern Naval Command. They will figure whether they need to shift the area of search." The fate of the flight, with 239 passengers and crew aboard, has been shrouded in mystery since it vanished off Malaysia's east coast less than an hour into a March 8 flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Full Story | Top |
| China consumer show targets camera maker Nikon in annual ritual Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 07:47 PM PDT  By Adam Jourdan SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Japan's Nikon Corp has moved to allay consumer fears in China after being criticized on a closely watched consumer show that said the camera maker had sold defective products in China and denied local consumers fair treatment in aftersales service. The firm, which had sales of 118 billion yen ($1.16 billion) in China in 2013, said on Sunday it was taking the report "very seriously" and had moved to improve its after-sales network in China, according to its official microblog sites. Criticism in Chinese state media can have a long-lasting impact, particularly in cases of corruption and food safety scandals, which have hit some firms over the last year, including French foodmaker Danone SA to British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline Plc. An annual investigative special on China Central Television (CCTV) called "3.15", similar to the CBS network's "60 Minutes" in the United States, said late on Saturday that some of Nikon's D600 cameras had black specks on the lens, and accused the firm of refusing requests to replace the defective products. Full Story | Top |
| Police search co-pilot's home in missing Malaysia plane probe Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 07:42 PM PDT Police investigating the disappearance of a Malaysian passenger jet more than a week ago have searched the home of the co-pilot, a senior official said, after the prime minister said the aircraft had been deliberately flown way off course. Prime Minister Najib Razak said on Saturday that the investigation would refocus on the crew and passengers of Flight MH370, after confirming that someone aboard appeared to have shut off the plane's communication systems before turning it away from its scheduled route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. A senior police official with knowledge of the investigation said special branch officers had searched the home of 27-year-old First Officer Fariq Abdul Hamid on Saturday evening. The Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200ER vanished in the early hours of March 8 with 239 passengers and crew aboard. Full Story | Top |
| NATO websites hit in cyber attack over Crimea stance Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 07:41 PM PDT By Adrian Croft and Peter Apps BRUSSELS/LONDON, March 15 - Unidentified hackers brought down several public NATO websites with cyber attacks on Saturday, the alliance said, in what appeared the latest escalation in cyberspace over growing tensions over Crimea. A group calling itself "cyber berkut" said the attack had been carried out by patriotic Ukrainians angry over what they saw as NATO interference in their country. Cyber berkut is a reference to the feared and since disbanded riot squads used by the government of ousted pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich. As well as the main NATO website www.NATO.int, the website of a NATO-affiliated cyber security center in Estonia was also affected. Full Story | Top |
| Magnitude 6.3 earthquake strikes northwestern Peru Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 06:50 PM PDT By Teresa Cespedes LIMA (Reuters) - A magnitude 6.3 earthquake struck northwestern Peru near its border with Ecuador on Saturday, the U.S. Geological Survey reported. Peru's National Civil Defense Institute (INDECI) said it had not received reports of serious damage or injuries, and authorities did not issue a tsunami alert. The quake struck at 6:51 p.m. local time (2351 GMT). Its epicenter was 28 miles south-southwest of Piura and it occurred at a depth of 6.1 miles, the USGS said. Brazilian construction company Odebrecht SA said its $700 million irrigation project in the area was unaffected. ... Full Story | Top |
| Honda aims to win fuel efficiency race in return to F-1 Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 05:31 PM PDT  By Norihiko Shirouzu and Yoko Kubota SUZUKA, Japan (Reuters) - After a seven-year hiatus, Honda Motor Co. is returning to the F-1 circuits next year, resolving to win more races - and learn how to build "greener" cars. Honda is particularly aiming to turn exhaust gas that is mostly wasted in F-1 or conventional cars into energy. It is technology that Honda's F-1 chief, Yasuhisa Arai, says could give Honda an edge with its mass-market cars. Cynics aren't buying the argument that Honda wants to use the F-1 as a technology incubator. Full Story | Top |
| NATO says its websites hit by cyber attacks Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 04:52 PM PDT Several NATO websites have been hit by cyber attacks, but they have had no impact on the military alliance's operations, a NATO spokeswoman said. The attacks, which affected NATO's main website, came amid rising tensions over Russian forces' occupation of Ukraine's Crimea region where a referendum is to be held on Sunday. NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu said on Twitter that several NATO websites have been the target of a "significant DDoS (denial of service) attack." She said there had been no operational impact and NATO experts were working to restore normal function. Full Story | Top |
| Creditors seize ship tied to Mexican oil company probe Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 03:26 PM PDT  Creditors to Oceanografia, a Mexican oil services company at the center of an alleged fraud that forced Citigroup to cut its 2013 profit, have seized a ship that was used as collateral for debt issued by the company. Norsk Tillitsmann, the Oslo-based trustee for some of Oceanografia's bonds , is preparing to sell the ship, OSA Goliath, to recoup funds for lenders, according to a letter published on Saturday on the trustee's website. The ship was seized on Friday in Aruban waters on Norsk Tillitsmann's request, the letter said. A spokesman for Oceanografia, whose main business was providing services for Mexico's state oil company Pemex , did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Full Story | Top |
| Florida head of crime tips program refuses to turn tip over to judge Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 03:06 PM PDT The director of a Crime Stoppers program in Miami, Florida, was facing jail on Saturday after refusing to hand over information in a drug case because he said it would violate the organization's promise to keep its tipsters anonymous. Richard Masten was sentenced Friday to 14 days behind bars for contempt of court after he refused to hand over the tip, which was written on a piece of paper. "The issue is the court asking Crime Stoppers to go back on their promise," Masten told the judge. Crime Stoppers programs are operated on both a local and national level, allowing community members to provide anonymous information about criminal activity without fear of prosecution or revenge. Full Story | Top |
| Malaysian plane saga highlights air defense gaps Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 01:20 PM PDT By Peter Apps and Frank Jack Daniel LONDON/NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Whatever truly happened to missing Malaysian Airlines flight MH370, its apparently unchallenged wanderings through Asian skies point to major gaps in regional - and perhaps wider - air defenses. On Saturday, Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak said authorities now believed the Boeing 777 flew for nearly seven hours after disappearing early on March 8. Either its crew or someone else on the plane disabled the on-board transponder civilian air traffic radar used to track it, investigators believe. It appears to have first flown back across the South China Sea - an area of considerable geopolitical tension and military activity - before overflying northern Malaysia and then heading out towards India without any alarm being raised. Full Story | Top |
| Ukrainian troops confront Russian forces on strip alongside Crimea Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 12:11 PM PDT KIEV/SIMFEROPOL (Reuters) - Ukraine's military scrambled aircraft and paratroops to confront Russian troops landing on a remote spit of land between Crimea and the mainland, defense officials said and the foreign ministry demanded their immediate withdrawal. The border guard service said Ukrainian forces had taken up defensive positions on Arbatskaya Strelka, running parallel to the east of Crimea, now controlled by Russian forces. It said about 60 Russian troops had landed on the strip and begun digging in, assisted by three armored personnel carriers. Full Story | Top |
| Honda recalls nearly 900,000 Odyssey vans in U.S. for fire risk Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 11:17 AM PDT  Honda Motor Co is recalling nearly 900,000 Odyssey minivans that could catch fire, the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said in a recall notice posted on Friday. In a March 13 filing with NHTSA, Honda said 2005-2010 Odysseys built in Alabama have a fuel-pump part that could crack and cause a fuel leak, increasing the risk of fire. Because the recall involves 886,815 Odyssey vans, Honda said the proper repair parts won't be available until summer. Honda said it had investigated several potential causes of cracks in the fuel-pump strainer cover, including acid from chemicals found in car washes and low-PH materials used in fertilizer and dust control agents. Full Story | Top |
| New York takes London's crown as top financial center: survey Saturday, Mar 15, 2014 10:42 AM PDT  New York has knocked London from its position as the world's leading global financial center after seven years, according to the Global Financial Centres Index compiled by London-based consultancy Z/Yen. London slipped from the top of the global rankings, scoring 784 against 786 for New York, because a series of own goals had tarnished its reputation, the report said. "London sees the largest fall in the top 50 centres," said Mark Yeandle, report author and associate director of Z/Yen, in a statement on the group's website. "This seems to be based on a number of factors including ... uncertainty over Europe, the perception that London might be becoming less welcoming to foreigners and perceived levels of market manipulation." Hong Kong and Singapore took third and fourth spots respectively, the same as a year ago, the survey showed. Full Story | Top |
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