A sand sculpture in remembrance of MH370 (Photo: AFP/Getty Images) Hanoi (VNA) – The relatives of 12 Chinese passengers onboard the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 began filing suits against the airline at a Beijing court on March 7, just a day before a legal deadline to do so.
The Beijing Rail Transportation Court has been designated to handle MH370 cases.
Lawyer Zhang Qihuai, whose Lanpeng firm represents the group who were filing suit, said many Chinese families still believe their relatives are alive and were "deeply conflicted" over the decision to go to court.
He added that originally, many didn't intend to sue, and instead wanted to continue waiting. But there's a time limit, so they have no other choice.
The compensation requested ranged from around five to eight million Chinese yuan (755,000 to 1.23 million USD) per victim, he said.
Earlier, a group of 12 families of the MH370 victims, including one Russian passenger, one Chinese and the rest Malaysians, also sued Malaysia Airlines and the Malaysian Government.
The Boeing 777 flight MH370 with 227 passengers and 12 crew members vanished en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014.
A major search led by Australia has been conducted in the sea area where the plane is believed to have crashed. However, only a few pieces of debris suspected of belonging to the plane have been discovered so far.-VNA
