The Malaysian diplomat tasked with investigating the disappearance of Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 has been killed in what is being called an ‘apparent assassination’.
Honorary Consul of Malaysia, Zahid Raza, was reportedly shot in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar, last Thursday.
Blaine Gibson, an American adventurer-detective, who is investigating the plane’s disappearance, has been gathering suspected MH370 debris as it washes up on the shores of Madagascar and Mozambique.
He said Mr Raza was ‘due to deliver new items to Malaysian investigators in Kuala Lumpur’ before his death, according to Australian news site news.com.au.
Flight MH370 was a scheduled international passenger flight that disappeared less than an hour after take-off on 8th March, 2014, from Kuala Lumpur International Airport to Beijing Capital International Airport in China.
It was revealed the plane changed course and headed south over the Indian Ocean, before seemingly vanishing with 239 people on board.
Since then, the fate of the aircraft has remained nothing short of a tragic mystery. Even after this time, we still don’t really know much about the investigation.
Blaine Gibson said he had planned to keep details of his latest finds under wraps until the pieces had been safely transported off the island but he’s now changed his mind.
Mr Gibson wrote in his blog:
For the protection of those involved we decided not to make this report public until the debris was safely delivered to Malaysia.
However tragic events have intervened. Under the agreement between the two countries, debris is supposed to be collected by Hon. Zahid Raza, the Honorary Malaysian Consul in Madagascar, and delivered by private courier to Malaysia.
On August 24, the Hon. Zahid Raza was assassinated in Antananarivo.
The plane’s black box has never been found, which has led to countless conspiracy theories about how and why the plane went down and so it’s no surprise that the assassination is being viewed by some as a ‘warning’, especially since Mr Gibson has himself received death threats.
Scary.
