welcome to what's next. comcastnbcuniversal. you're watching "cnn newsroom." welcome to our viewers in the u.s. and around the world. straight to our top stories now. the mystery deepens. an expanded search area covering thousands of miles. where is flight 370? intense scrutiny on the plane's captain and copilot. what have investigators found so far? celebrations in parts of ukraine as the voters in crimea decide to join russia. our top story, the search

for malaysian airlines flight 370 is now well into its tenth day, and so far no trace of that aircraft. investigators now believe the plane had enough fuel to fly at least seven hours after breaking contact with controllers. that opens the search area way up to include 11 countries and large portions of the indian ocean. in other words, it could be anywhere in that region. right now authorities say the disappearance is likely the result of deliberate action on board the plane and they are looking closely at the two men you see here. the captain there on the left and the copilot. meantime in beijing, people with loved ones aboard the flight have lost patience, as you might imagine, with the malaysian government. 25 countries have sent crews to search the land, sea and air for the missing flight. jim clancy joins us from kuala lumpur where the airplane took off march 8th. it's just amazing what the world still doesn't know, jim.

>> exactly. in 26 countries you can add one to that. australia jumping in with both feet. just very briefly, let me go down the list. a lot of air assets being offered up from australia , new zealand, republic of korea, japan and the united states that's had an o orion searching for many, many days now. all of them are out there, all of them are looking. as this search intensifies, 26 countries are cooperating. they're hoping to get the radar records that might apply to this time frame to see if that aircraft, which was not using its identifier code, would show up as a blip on the radar for any of these countries. meantime as you noted the pilots under scrutiny. videotapes surfaced on social media. it purports to show the two pilots as they went through security before boarding flight 370 here in kuala lumpur.

of course, cnn can't ver fit authenticity of the video or the date that it was taken. but that's what it claims to have shown. also on social media, a really haunting video that is put up by uncle aries' relatives. it appears some of the young people in the family of captain ahmed shah, age 53, put this video up on the internet, take a look. ♪ ♪ somewhere over the rainbow ♪ way up high >> the video is a collection of photographs, family photographs, through the years. it concludes with a message that says, uncle ari, we love you, come home. very haunting. the family, of course, trying to support the claims of his

friends and others that he couldn't possibly have had anything to do with this. and of course there is no evidence, natalie. there is no evidence against him. we've tried to note that repeatedly. the pilots come under a lot of scrutiny. everybody on that aircraft is being reexamined for any ties to terror, as everyone is mystified to have an explanation for what happened tonight 370. natalie? >> and there the family is coming out to talk about their loved one. the pilot. what about the copilot? what do we know about his family? >> well, we do know that he -- i believe he was living with his parents. very little class surroundings. you know, there was some controversial photos of him smoking in the cockpit with two young ladies. after all, he is a 29-year-old pilot, not totally unexpected behavior. seemed to be normal in every sense. people have said that he was a bright young man, he had a lot to look forward to. some say that he was planning on

getting married. all kinds of reasons to think that these people had nothing to do with it. we simply have no evidence, we have no answers to any of this. and that's what's so frustrating right now, natalie. >> it's absolutely unreal. all right, jim clancy there for us, thank you, jim. india's air force and navy have temporarily suspended their search for the missing airliner, but merchant ships are being told to keep an eye out. one of the areas that got investigators' attention early on is india's remoete andaman islands. >> reporter: this vast expanse of the andaman sea scrutinized by every indian vessel that sails it. the andaman administration has sent a notice to all government civilian and cargo ships to be on the lookout for any signs of the missing malaysian aircraft. >> if we find anything, any

debris, life jackets, we should report it to the port control. >> reporter: the captain is a master of the "rani chang," a passenger ship serving the remote andaman islands. how difficult is it to find anything in this vast expanse of sea? >> it is very, very difficult. especially if the debris is small pieces. >> reporter: but as a former indian navy commander who served his country for two decades in this archipelago of 572 islands stretching 500 miles in the indian ocean. >> right now from sumatra, 60, 70 miles. you can go malaga strait from these islands. >> reporter: post famous for its untouched beaches, reserved

forests and indigenous tribes who still hunt and gather, 94% of those islands are uninhabited or off-limits to people. no one here believes the theory that the malaysian airplane was hijacked and deliberately headed towards the andamens. >> after landing somewhere over here? it is not possible. want my frank opinion? i don't think it is here. >> reporter: for daze the indian navy and air force have been searching an area spanning more than 250,000 square kilometers near the 100,000 square miles from the andamen sea to the bay of bengal. this is the navy dockyard from which the indian operation was launched. over there you can see the coast guard vessels. these vessels have been combing the length of the andaman islands all the way south

towards malaga straits since thursday. after reporting no sightings, india's military search was temporarily suspended on sunday. but for passenger ships, the search request still stands. >> you've been looking into this unbelievable search area. that is one ship and one section near the and a man islands. it's unfathomable. >> that was the easy part. the gulf of thailand was supposedly easy. the strait of may lag ga was easy. now you're expanding it, even based on that one satellite perspective, you're talking about the himalayas, a region very mountainous. just based on that one area you're talking about an area that's equivalent to two-thirds of the united states, the continental u.s. size, that's where we're trying to find one airplane. that's why this is an absolutely remarkable search taking place when it comes to the vast expanse of nature.

initially this was an area we were looking at carefully. the eastern fringe kind of more focused on the western fringe where we know there is two arcs in place based on a satellite ping that took place at 8:11 a.m. the day of the disappearance of the aircraft. one to the north, one to the south. this shows you the coverage of 2,200 nautical miles of this aircraft and where it could have flown. it doesn't mean the flight took place along this path, this means somewhere along this path, wind 160 kilometers or 200 miles each way of this path, the plane was detected at one point or another. say 8:11 in the morning on the first morning of the disappearance of the aircraft. it shows you what a large region we're talking about. and the mountains and oceans in this region, all of it making it that much more challenging. we'll talk about that in the next 30 or so minutes. the reason we only have one region and no direct location is we only have one satellite that detected this aircraft. people think that you need just one satellite on your cell phone or in your car's gps unit to

locate your device. but it takes up to at least three because they triangulate on a spot and it gives you an exact latitude and longitude coordinate to detect where that object is. we only have one satellite to go by. that's why we have an arc. we know the western fringe, the aircraft did not have enough fuel to get to. we're left with one coming to the south, one coming to the north, that is why the search is taking place in this region. we'll talk about this in detail in a few minutes as well. 249 people on that plane. that's 249 stories that are tragic and so many families and friends grieving. we have one story for you right now in malaysia. there were some children who begged their father not to travel far away for a new job. unfortunately, he wound up aboard the missing flight. his family is desperate to know what happened to him.

>> reporter: for family of the passengers on flight 370, the wait is excruciatinexcruciating. "fy had -- if i had two or three i might be able to accept it. but this is my only son." he's waiting for his son. 34-year-old pusbanatan, an i.t. specialist who was headed to beijing for a new job. "surely they might find the plane. that's all i hope for. the whole world is out looking for it." i ask him, what if they don't? he answers, "if not, only god knows. it's in god's hands. it's fate." he tells me he worked 20 years as a security guard to put his son through college. and at home a wife and two young children also wait for him. he was responsible for

everything, his father says, even these clothes i'm wearing. whatever country he was, in he would call. and once a week he would come see us with the whole family. he really took care of us." >> he was telling me that the two younger children didn't want to see their father go to beijing. so they clung to his legs and refused to let him go out the door until he promised to bring them chocolates and presents when he got home. it's very sad. before we leave, he tells us to call any time with any news we have. he hardly sleeps, he says. and now he never turns his phone off. not even for a moment. atika schubert, cnn, kuala lumpur, malaysia. >> just one of the many incredibly sad stories that we'll be hearing about regarding the families that are grieving what they believe is the loss of

so many. the other story that we continue to follow is from crimea. we have this just in to cnn. crimean election officials have just released the final results of this weekend's controversial referendum in ukraine's southern republic. they say 96.7% of crimean voters casting ballots sunday chose to break off from ukraine and to join russia. while the vote is recognized by crimea and russia, the new ukrainian government in kiev does not recognize sunday's referendum, nor do the united states and other western nations. and we'll dig deep into that situation coming up here on "cnn newsroom." live reports from crimea after this.

welcome back. crimea's capital is celebrating after a historic vote. early preliminary results showed the region voting to leave the

ukraine and become part of russia. the final results are in. 96.7% voting in favor. russia's lower house of parliament now plans to act soon on legislation allowing crimea to join russia. european ministers plan to meet in the coming hours to discuss sanctions now against moscow. let's goo to crimea for the latest from there. diana joins me live. she's been there for many days. ever since the mysterious russian troops moved in. and now this. diana? >> reporter: yes of yes, exactly. i think that is the point we must remember, that this entire referendum was held under the gaze of military occupation. even if mr. putin says the troops on crimean territory aren't his. huge celebrations last night. the newly appointed pro-russian

leader of this region standing before these crowds and saying, we are going home. that is certainly the feeling that many ethnic russians here feel, that they are returning to the motherland. many of them were born and raised in the soviet union and remember that crimea was handed over by nikita khrushchev in 1954 to ukraine but it remained a part of the soviet union until the dissolution of the ussr in 1989. and therefore many people still feel that this really belongs to russia and that the last 23 years of ukrainen rule did them little good. they feel they will have their lives improved economically as being part of russia and they'll be better looked after. that's why we have this celebration. 96.7% voting for russia. just 2.5% choosing the other option. this rather ambiguous claim of

being kind of awe ton mulls state, loosely associated somehow with ukraine. certainly the crimean. >> tattar group here decided to boycott the vote, many ethnic ukrains boycotting the vote. still, 83% voter turn ott, very, very high. i was at those polling stations yesterday. there were transparent ballot boxes and you could see people just dropping in their ballot papers without folding them up. i only say one where there was a cross on the second box which was the pro-ukraine box. every single other paper was a tick in the cross for russia. so this result is hardly surprising. >> right, and many voting with their heart and wanting to rejoin the motherland of russia. but in terms of lifestyle and economics, what's going to be different for this region, perhaps? >> reporter: well, they will

have to go through a lot of logistical change. they will now get the ruble. will probably move to russian time zone -- to moscow time zone. and they will have to get their electricity, their water supply, all of that kind of thing, from the russian federation rather than from ukraine. the economic benefits? well, president putin has promised that he will pump in a huge cash injection to crimea. certainly more than the ukrain economy can afford right now. so perhaps there will be improvements, particularly for salaries, for example. sorry, pensions. military pensions especially. that was one sort of bone passed out to those ukrain troops in their bases that if they switched allegiance to crimea, their military pensions would be far higher than anything ukraine could offer them. it's interesting to talk about those troops. there is now a truce agreed, natalie, for the next week, until friday, so that there will

be no kind of confrontation between the russian troops outside of those bases and ukrain troops inside. they will stop a blockade so they will have food and provisions. of course friday is when they'll meet to discuss the accession of crimea to the russian federation. >> it's happening so quickly. thanks so much. the leaders of the u.s. and russia spoke by phone on sunday. u.s. president barack obama told russian president vladimir putin the west will not recognize the result of crimea's referendum. while mr. putin insisted sunday's vote is legal and moscow will accept it. a former u.s. ambassador to ukraine says russia has basically torn up the rule book and the west must respond. >> going back to the budapest memorandum, i think it's now very important for the united states and britain, which signed that memorandum alongside russia, ur russia's violated its

commitment to respect ukraine's independence and not use force against ukraine. united states and britain owe to it ukraine to back that up. not with military force but with diplomatic, economic and political help. >> let's get the view from moscow. frederick is there at the russian capital. certainly, frederick, vladimir putin has gotten what he wants and seems to be shrugging off any threat by the west. >> reporter: well, he certainly is shrugging off those threats, even though he is keeping the diplomatic lines open with leaders from the west as we've just heard. he had that phone call with barack obama and certainly we do expect more calls between foreign minister sergei lavrov and the secretary of state of the united states, with john kerry, as well. also the french foreign minister and french defense minister are set to visit moscow tomorrow. so all of that is still going on. you're absolutely right, it seems as though vladimir putin has made the strategic calculation that taking crimea is a very, very big deal internationally, but he is willing to bear the costs of

whatever they may be of those actions. certainly the russian economy is already preparing for sanctions. there are a lot of analysts here in moscow who say they expect that these sanctions could be quite painful for the russian economy. however, vladimir putin has said he's willing to shoulder those sanctions. on the other hand, of course, you also have russia potentially getting kicked out of international organizations like the g-8. the gist that we're getting here from moscow is that's something that the russians don't think is going to be too painful. they say they felt quite marginalized in the g-8 anyhow. they know it's a big deal, however, to vladimir putin, to his constituents, to the people who support him, getting crimea back certainly is a much bigger deal. also quite frankly at this point for vladimir putin's political legacy, this is something that he would be remembered as the russian leader who brought crimea back to russia. that certainly would be a large achievement in the eyes of many russians. >> he has crimea back to russia,

presumably. the question is how far might he be willing to go? now there are reports that troops, russian troops have moved to other parts of ukraine. >> reporter: certainly, that's the big question is what's going to happen with the rest of ukraine? there are troop movements as you said to sort of fringe areas of crimea. the russians there taking a gas plant close to the crimean peninsula. that's something that certainly isn't viewed as a major incursion into ukrain territory. however, the big question is what's going to happen to other places where we've been seeing the last couple of days pro-russian demonstrations there as well. and the rhetoric that's coming out of the russian foreign ministry is one that is very troublesome where the foreign ministry says they've gotten a lot of calls from people in eastern ukraine for russian forces to move in and to protect them. it's the same kind of rhetoric that we heard before russian forces moved into the crimean

peninsula. right now that's the big question. is russia planning to do that as well? certainly that would up the ante considerably on many levels. on one hand you have forces moving in there, that already is not as pro-russian as crimea is and certainly if russian forces moved in they would probably have insurgency on their hands in no time. >> all right, from moscow, thanks, fred. ahead, oscar pistorius back in the dock today. a look at what's expected for week three of his trial on murder charges.

. welcome back. we continue to follow the search for the malaysian airliner and the korean referendum. here's a check of other news we're following. a 6.7 magnitude quake struck off chile's pacific coast sunday. some people got out of buildings and ran into the streets just for safety.

a tsunami was generated but there are no reports of widespread damage from it or the earthquake. the violence in syria has once again spilled into neighboring lebanon. a suicide bombing killed two people and wounded 14 and inn a hezbollah stronghold. two groups claimed responsibility. hezbollah fighters are supporting president bashar al assad's regime in syria's civil war. oscar pistorius has arrived at the court in pretier yeah for day 11 of his trial. more forensics testimony is expected this week. last week the prosecution introduced evidence from the night the olympian shot his girlfriend, reeva 10 camp. an investigator said he saw a ballistic expert handle the gun without gloves. the sprinter, olympic sprinter, maintains he is not guilty because he mistook his girlfriend for an intervieweder. the search area for flight

370 has expanded. ahead, we'll show you how 25 countries are now trying to find any trace of the missing plane. meantime, in beijing tensions are reaching a boiling point as family members wait for answers. we'll we'll take you there live.

malaysia says 26 countries are involved in the search for the missing airliner. the search spans 11 countries and large portions of the indian ocean. the flight went missing march 8th, 239 people on board. russia's lower house of parliament may pass legislation as soon as friday allowing crimea to join russia. crimean residents overwhelmingly voted to leave ukraine. the final vote in favor was more than 96%. kiev calls the vote illegitimate. the u.s. and western powers also denounce the vote as a sham. new sanctions against russia could soon be on the way. u.s. president barack obama warned russian president vladimir putin that washington is prepared to impose additional costs on russia for its actions.

european union foreign ministers meet in brussels within hours to talk as well about sanctions. authorities are looking at who and what was on board 370 when it went missing. the manifest found no hazardous materials so the focus is back on these men, the pilots, and the likelihood that deliberate action on board the airplane may have caused the disappearance. even though there's been absolutely no trace of the airliner, investigators have managed to put together the events leading up to the plane's disappearance. >> reporter: many questions remain as the search for malaysia airlines flight 370 continues. here's how experts reconstruct key moments of the flight. 12:41 a.m., march 8th. the plane took off as planned

from kuala lumpur headed for beijing. shortly after takeoff, someone likely turned off the plane's communication system, akars, which collects information on the performance of the plane and pilot. it sends the information via satellite to any authorized parties on the ground. around 1:30 a.m., the transresponder on 370 was also disabled. the transresponder sends squawks to radar systems with the plane's flight number, height, speed and correction. this is when malaysian air traffic controllers say they lost contact between malaysia and vietnam. it is believed around the same time, someone in the plane's cockpit made the final voice check-in with air traffic control. "all right, good night" were the final words from the cockpit. at 2:40 a.m., even though the plane wasn't transmitting information, malaysian military radar tracked it over the strait of malaga, hundreds of miles off course and in the opposite

direction. that was the last time it showed up on radar. but a satellite detected it at 8:11 a.m., more than seven hours after takeoff, during routine handshakes or electronic connections the satellite makes with aircraft below. it wasn't enough to pinpoint the exact location of the plane, but suggests it is within a large geographic arc that extends north as far as kazakhstan and south over the indian ocean. more than a week after takeoff, the location of flight 370 is still a mystery. >> malaysian police have now searched the homes of both the pilot and copilot of the airliner. this as the investigation into the missing plane focuses more on the two men who were in the cockpit. atika schubert reports from kuala lumpur. >> reporter: as the search now expands to two separate corridors to the north and the south, police are now

investigating both of the men who were in the cockpit. the captain and his copilot. they went to both of their homes, searched inside, also spoke to relatives. in the case of the captain, actually removed a homemade flight simulator that he had made himself, looking for clue toth see if there's any indication of why this change in flight path may have been taken. we did have some more details about the pilots and the rest of the passengers on board that investigators are now looking at. >> yesterday officers from the royal police visited the homes of the pilot. they spoke to family members of the pilot and examined the flight sim simulator. according to malaysian airlines the pilot and copilot did not ask to fly together on 370. >> indian vessels searching near

the andaman islands have suspended their search for now. that is because malaysia, which is coordinating this effort, is now reconsidering how to best use those resources. remember that the area here has expanded dramatically. it used to be 14 countries involved in this everyday. now it's more than 20. malaysia is asking all the countries involved to provide satellite information or any radar data they might have to pinpoint the exact location of vanished flight 370. atika schubert, kuala lumpur, malaysia. friends and relatives of the 53-year-old captain are defending his reputation. his family released this video on youtube showing personal photos of the captain throughout his career. a friend said it's wrong to place blame with so little information. >> i feel particularly affected

by the lack of evidence. questioning his credibility, terrorism links, issues like that. i think it's a little bit insensitive and unfair to the family. >> a senior u.s. law enforcement official told cnn investigators are trying to determine whether either pilot had any plan or motive to jeopardize the flight. no one has found that quite yet, or at least they're not saying. families waiting for any shred of information are understandably frustrated to say the least. cnn's pauline shoe has been speaking with some of them in beijing and she joins us now with how they're coping. pauline, hello. >> reporter: hi, natalie. i'm at the hotel where most of the family members are saying and gather for daily news briefings. the briefing is later on today, in about three hours.

yesterday we saw families with outbursts of anger directed at representatives. today there is a somber, more palm atmosphere. one relative told us today she thinks people ar little bit more relaxed today, ironically because there is no news. i did walk into that briefing room, a ballroom that has been converted into an update room. there are a handful of family members there, about three dozen. i suspect that most of the relatives are in their hotel rooms resting, waiting for this briefing in a few hours. they were talking with airline representatives who were there to help, there's a buddhist spiritual group here to help them. i saw relatives pull chairs together in circles. they were just chatting with each other. a few people were watching television, they were watching the news and updates on the search. but the reality, natalie, is that this is a -- relatives' lives are on hold. many of them come from far away,

from all corners of china. they don't know how long they will stay but they are hanging on to my shred of evidence that gives them optimism. for example, the fact that there's no debris found. that for one is actually making them a little bit hopeful, natalie. >> well, i can understand, if i had a family member on that flight i would be clinging to any hope as well. you know, it's interesting to me, pauline, that they haven't gone home to where they have neighbors and supporters and people they work with to support them. they've stayed there with each other. i assume that they're getting support from the others that are going through what they're going through. >> yeah, that's a great point. i did ask one person, how are you getting through each day? we're going into the tenth day. it's just been ten days of anguish. and he said he actually finds support by being with other people. and getting to know other people. and when they see one person is

down, they try to lift them up. and so they're finding strength in strangers, really, from being with each other and having the shared unfortunate experience. and then trying to hope together as a group. and one interesting note on that, here in china, there's something called rechat, an app that almost everyone has on their smartphones. well, this group of family members, they have one huge group on rechat. and it's 400 members. imagine. that just gives you an idea of how desperate they are for any sort of information. they've all come together and they're armed with one big group chat, trading information. >> good that they have some people to lean on there. none of us can even imagine what they're going through. pauline chiou for us there in beijing, thank you. there are so many unanswered questions about the disappearance of this flight. we want to remind you our website tackles a lot of it.

the big ten questions surrounding what we know, what we don't know. you'll find it at cnn.com/international. while crimea is celebrating the outcome of this weekend's referendum on rejoining russia, the mood in kiev is anything but joyful. ukraine's prime minister said, and we quote, "the ground will burn under crimea's leaders' feet."

welcome back. crimea's capital is celebrating after an historic and controversial vote. in sunday's referendum, crimeans overwhelmingly voted to leave ukraine and rejoin russia. the crimean election commission says the final vote in favor, 96.7%.

the referendum has drawn international condemnation. both the u.s. and european union are expected to announce sanctions against russia, perhaps as soon as today. tensions have been running high in the eastern ukrainian city of donesk. pro-russia demonstrators stormed a government building there and replaced the ukrainian flag with a russian one, demanding the release of a pro-moscow movement leader who was arrested there earlier this month. also there, cnn's matthew chance. >> reporter: as ukraine starts to splinter, this is its latest flash point. in the eastern city of donesk, thousands of demonstrators stormed the state prosecutor's office. replacing its ukrainian flag with the tri-color of russia. >> is think this is a democratic revolution. people in the country don't like government in kiev. in kiev this is not people government.

>> reporter: elsewhere in the city, other symbols of the interim authorities in kiev also attacked. this the headquarters of ukrainian security service who arrested a pro-russian leader earlier this month. riot police have tried and failed to hold back these angry mobs. you can see the pro-russian protesters here in donesk have broken through the doors of the security building here in the center of the city. they're demanding the release of their leader. they want much more than that too. they want a referendum along the lines of crimea to decide whether to join with the russian federation or to become more interest or aewe ton miscellaneous question within ukraine. >> reporter: the big question whether moscow is cob templating a crimea-style intervention here too. at the moment it's holding back but the kremlin has reserved the right to bring these people under what it calls its

protection. in time these calls for a soviet-like reunion with russia may grow even louder. >> so that is the situation in doneks. ukraine's prime minister says supporters of the referendum want to destroy ukraine's independence. ivan watson has more now on reaction from the capital kiev. ♪ >> reporter: in kiev, the mood is grim. ukrainians are still mourning the dead. laying flowers in honor of nearly 100 people killed here last month. and now they face a new threat. the russian military occupation of crimea. and a referendum vote calling for crimea's separation from ukraine.

she was telling me she's drawing a direct parallel with her sign here between adolf hitler's annexation in 1938 and what looks like the imminent russian annexation of crimea this year. people fought and died here to defend their vision of the future of ukraine. but now russian troops are massing along ukraine's eastern border. "we need to defend our country. we don't want to fight but we can't just give up our land." some men here say they're volunteering to defend ukraine. >> i just went to military checkpoint and left my phone just in case of any emergency state. i'm ready to go. but either one, but i'm ready to go.

>> and fight? >> and fight, yeah, of course. >> reporter: ukrainians have made great sacrifices here. but they're beginning to realize that more land and lives may be lost in the months to come. ivan watson, cnn, kiev. >> in the wake of sunday's crimea referendum, european ministers are to meet today to discuss sanctions against moscow. nina dos santos is covering that angle for us from cnn london. >> let's start out by taking a look at what these sanctions could mean for russia. take a look at the ruble denominated index in russia. started out the week upbeat as you can see towards the end of that chart. it's rallying on the back of that news coming out of crimea. but as you can see, the trajectory over the course of the first three months of the year has been abysmal. last week it fell in the double digits. day by day. and of course that's pushed this

market into what's called bear market territory which means it's slumped more than 20% over the course of one quarter alone. the big question is what kind of sanctions we'll see put on the table. the reason why it hasn't done so badly in today's session is because there's optimism about these sanctions being largely targeted towards certain individuals. we're talking about visa and travel restrictions as well as asset freezes. key individuals, not really trade sanctions that could hit the russian economy. but if things escalate towards the trade sanctions route, obviously that could have a huge ramification for russia's economy which already isn't doing all that well. let me remind you 15% of russian gdp is contingent upon russian exports towards the european union, the eu on the one hand only gets about 1% of its gdp as a trading bloc with exports toward russia. if things turn nasty on the energy front, that's where the eu could be affected. here in europe we do rely on

russia for at least one-quarter of our gas needs and we're by no means out of the winter yet. >> much to consider on the broader global scale here of what this small region has just decided. the next question is how will the markets react? >> we've got about ten minutes until the london and european session starts trading. so futures markets indicating we could see a hit bit of a sinking feeling when things get out of the gate. also u.s. futures indicating things might also trade south. we've got a number of hours before wall street gets started later on. but i should also point out that the asian markets haven't done tremendously well in today's session as you'd expect on the back of concerns around geopolitical tensions. as you can see we have the sydney market losing .22% on the day. the tokyo nikkei around about .35%, not a huge movement but i point out a number of these markets, just like the

moscow, the ruble-dough nominated exchange, already have written in a number of concerns. we saw nikkei sinking 6.2% last week alone. today just adds to that concern. >> we thank you, nina dos santos, on the economic angle of this story from london. search crews as we mentioned trying to find some trace of the missing malaysia airline arer. we'll have the latest on the expanding effort. it expands now across 11 countries, not just an ocean. more about that in just a moment.

still there are more questions than answers about malaysia airlines flight 370. we wish we had something more. malaysian officials say searchers from, can you believe this, 26 countries are looking

for this airplane. investigators say that deliberate action by someone on the plane likely caused the jet to change course and head into one of two opposite directions with at least seven hours worth of fuel on board when the flight went missing. the search air is mind bogglingly huge. it stretches across 11 countries and large swaths of the indian ocean which is very, very deep. we'll continue to keep you updated on the missing plane. let's check other news as well. oscar pistorius has arrived at court for week three of his trial. that's him walking in. more expert testimony is expected this week along the prosecution tries to show that the olympian shot his girlfriend reeva steenkamp on purpose pistorius says it was an accident. the beermaker guinness has cropped its sponsorship of new york's st. patrick's day parade. the reason? gay and lesbian groups will not

be able to march openly. this is the latest beer giant to pull out of the st. patrick's day festival. line ka 9 and sam adams stopped their support for the very same reason. the french government says it will restrict driving in parts of paris today in hopes of cutting the heavy smog. drivers will be able to use their vehicles only on alternate days for the first time since 1997. warm nights and cold days have kept the pollution from breaking up. with more on this story, let's check in with our meteorologist. hasn't been this bad since 1997. >> we don't talk about this often. usually the air quality is around 38. that's the average for the city in recent years. that is on the upper end of what is considered good. so it certainly is not a problem across this region. we were at 180 to 200 friday into saturday. officials here reduced the speed limit, low visibility, that was the reason for that. no outdoor fires allowed. also trash burning. also chimney fires were not

recommended either. agricultural fires being banned as well. this not only told you the public transport here available, especially because a lot of the vehicles based on your license plate number cannot be on the roads the next 24 hours. free public transport from friday into saturday, now they say sunday into monday. so this monday morning, free public transport available in the city of paris. we also know that, of course, theoreming to avoid any sort of outdoor activity just because of the air quality there. but it has improved because of all those that have been observed in recent daze. quickly, let's talk about this region of southeast asia, eventually stretching into western asia where the potential track of flight 370 was. because the depths of the waters across this region of the gulf of thailand, roughly downwards of 80 meters, about 250 feet deep, 4,000 meters across the indian ocean. that is about 13,000 feet deep. we're talking an immense region. the java trench sits at 7,400

meters, about 24,000 feet deep. remarkable stretch of water here, a search would be very difficult. there's only one island i could spot in the southern track there, not going to be capable of bringing a plane down on that island. did it take a northerly track be? some of the highest mountains in the world, 100 peaks over 24,000 feet high. a lot of tough terrain to be searching. >> unbelievable. it's out there somewhere. petro, thank you. that is it for this hour of "cnn newsroom." i'm natalie allen. the news continues next.

breaking news this morning -- the search intensifies for flight 370. thousands of miles being scoured to find this passenger jet that just disappeared from the sky with hundreds of passengers on board. no trace at this moment. this morning, new questions about the pilots on board. could they have purposely shut down the plane's communications for steering this flight off course? we have live team coverage covering all the angles and the very latest developments from overnight. plus, breaking news in ukraine -- crimea voting to secede from the country and join russia.