China says none of its citizens on Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 were hijackers

(CNN) -- China says it has found no evidence that any of its citizens on board Malaysia Airlines' missing Flight 370 were involved in hijacking or terrorism.

Background checks on all passengers from the Chinese mainland on the plane has found nothing to support such suspicions, Huang Huikang, the Chinese ambassador to Malaysia, said Tuesday, according to the state-run Chinese news agency Xinhua.

Authorities have said they are investigating all 239 people who were on board the Boeing 777-200, which disappeared over Southeast Asia more than 10 days ago en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

According to the airline, 154 of the 227 passengers on board the plane came from mainland China or Hong Kong.

Malaysia says the evidence gathered so far suggests the plane was deliberately flown off course, turning west and traveling back over the Malay Peninsula and out into the Indian Ocean.

But they so far don't know who was at the controls or why whoever it was took the plane far away from its original destination.

They're also not sure where it ended up, saying its last known location detected by a satellite is somewhere along two wide arcs, one stretching north over Asia and the other south into the Indian Ocean. The plane's last electronic connection with the satellite was about six hours after it last showed up on Malaysian military radar.

By effectively ruling out suspicions for a large majority of the passengers, Chinese authorities appear to have significantly shortened the list of possible suspects.

The Chinese ambassador's statement is also likely to greatly dampen speculation that Uyghur separatists from China's far western region of Xinjiang might have been involved in the plane's disappearance. One of the two long corridors where authorities say the plane was last detected stretched over Xinjiang, and unconfirmed reports had suggested the possibility that Uyghur's might be connected to the case.

Malaysian officials weren't immediately available to comment on the Chinese ambassador's comments.

China said Tuesday that it had begun to search for the plane in the parts of its territory that fall under the northern corridor.

The pilot and co-pilot of the missing plane, both them Malaysian, have come under particular scrutiny in the search for clues. Investigators say that whoever flew the plane off course for hours appeared to know what they were doing.

But officials have so far reported no evidence to tie the pilots to the plane's disappearance


By Jethro Mullen, CNN

FOR HOT NEWS PLEASE CLICK HERE