picture shared by BBC over its Twitter feed shows the two men. BBC PIX
SEPANG (March 11): The identity of one of the passengers on board the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, said to be holding stolen passports, has been uncovered today.
It was a 19-year old Iranian by the name of Pouria Nour Mohammad Mehrdad whom the police believed is not a member of any terrorist-linked organisations after doing a background check.
"We have also checked other police organisations on his profile and we believe he is not likely to be a member of any terrorist groups," said Inspector General of Police Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar.
On March 8, it was reported that there were two "imposters" with stolen passports on board the MH370, namely an Italian, Luigi Maraldi, 37, and an Austrian, Christian Kozel, 30.
Khalid said the Iranian, believed to be trying to migrate to Germany, was holding the Austrian passport while the other passenger has yet to be identified.
“We are in contact with his mother. She is expecting him to arrive in Frankfurt. When he did not arrive, she contacted us,” he said, adding that Pouria’s mother knew that he was travelling using a stolen passport.
IGP: All who booked ticket boarded the plane
Khalid also contradicted earlier report that there were five people who checked in at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) but were not in the missing MH370.
“From our investigation, there is no such thing. There were no five passengers who checked in that did not board. All who booked this flight boarded it,” he said.
So far, he said, only one person, identified to be a female student, called MAS to cancel her booking for the MH370 flight to Beijing because she mistook the date of departure.
Khalid also announced that the investigation team headed by Criminal Investigation Department director Datuk Hadi Ho Abdullah will be looking into four areas namely hijacking, sabotage, psychological problem of passengers and crew and personal problem among passengers and crew.
“Somebody there in the flight may have bought huge sum of insurance and wants the family to gain from it. We are looking into all possibilities,” he cited a possible case scenario.
Stolen passports: Clearance according to procedure
Meanwhile, Immigration Director-General Datuk Aloyah Mamat said the Standard Operating Procedure of the Immigration Department was followed during the clearance of both passengers with the stolen passports.
“The image of the bearer and the biodata page of the produced passports were matched. Relevant questions on the reason for travelling into the country were also posed to the subjects (individuals),” she said.
Pouria who used an Austrian passport with the number P2979523 arrived in KLIA on Feb 28 this year at 8.28pm.
The other unidentified individual using an Italian passport with the number YA3189197 claimed to have arrived from Phuket via flight QR849 on Feb 28 at 8.31pm.
Both of them were each given a social visit pass valid for 90 days.
Aloyah also said since both the passengers with stolen passports used the same passports on arrival and departure, they were not detected using the biometric system.
She however was not sure if their passports were equipped with biometric mechanism.
MAS flight MH370 went missing en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing after taking off from KLIA at 12.41am on Saturday. It should have landed in Beijing at 6.30am.
It disappeared from DCA's radar at 1.30am Saturday, about 120 nautical miles east off Kota Baru, Kelantan.
The flight was carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew members. There were a total of 153 Chinese Nationals, 38 Malaysians and other passengers from 13 different countries.
Read more: http://www.fz.com/content/igp-man-stolen-passport-not-terrorist-also-contradicts-dca#ixzz2vi8ctIZu
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