One of the two men who used stolen passports to board the missing Malaysia Airlines jet has been identified according to the nation’s inspector general of police. Authorities are not releasing details of his nationality but confirmed he is neither Malaysian nor from Xinjiang, China (the home of the Uighur separatists who have come under suspicion following Taiwanese authorities tip last week warning that terrorists were targeting Beijing’s international airport).
Via LA Times, [5]
Malaysian authorities have identified one of the two men who used stolen passports to board the missing Malaysia Airlines jet, the nation’s inspector general of police told local media Monday, as international search teams continued to look -- so far unsuccessfully -- for wreckage from the jet.
"I can confirm that he is not a Malaysian, but cannot divulge which country he is from yet," Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar told the Star, a major Malaysian newspaper. He added that the man is also not from Xinjiang, China -- a northwestern province of the mainland home to minority Uighurs. Uighur separatists have been blamed for a knifing rampage in southwestern China this month that left 29 dead.
Meanwhile, a Taiwanese official said national security officials received an anonymous tip last week warning that terrorists were targeting Beijing’s international airport.
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According to the report by Taiwan’s Central News Agency, a man speaking Chinese claimed to have information of planned attacks directed against Beijing’s airport and subway system by the East Turkestan Independence Movement, an Islamic-inspired group seeking independence for the Uighurs. The caller identified himself as a member of a French-based anti-terror network and said he had called Taiwan’s national airline because he couldn’t reach anybody in Beijing.
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As of Monday evening in Malaysia, investigators have found no confirmed wreckage of the airliner despite an intensive search by more than 40 ships and nearly three dozen aircraft off the southern coast of Vietnam.