Australia does not currently plan to extend the search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, despite the recommendation of investigators to do so, Reuters cited a spokeswoman for the national transport minister as saying.

The investigators' report, released Tuesday, December 20, does not amount to the credible, new evidence required to extend the search, Kerri Griffiths, a spokeswoman for Australia's Infrastructure and Transport minister Darren Chester, said by telephone.

The current search area in the Indian Ocean is due to be exhausted by January. Flight MH370 disappeared in March 2014 with 239 passengers and crew on board, most of them Chinese, en route to Beijing from the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur.