Australian PM confident on position of MH370 black box

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said on Friday that he is confident the signals monitored in the search for Malaysian flight MH370 were from the black box of the missing plane. [Special coverage]

"We have very much narrowed down the search area and we are very confident that the signals that we are detecting are from the black box on MH370," Abbott said in Shanghai.

The prime minister said he was confident that "we know the position of the black box flight recorder to within some kilometers."

The latest finding "is not the same as" recovering the wreckage still deep beneath the sea, he said.

The battery of the black box usually can last for a month. The signals coming from the black box is fading for the incident happened more than a month ago.

Australia, along with China and other countries involved, will try every effort to continue the search, Abbott said at a luncheon in Shanghai.

Up to 14 planes and 13 ships joined in Thursday's search for the missing plane following Wednesday's "encouraging lead", or the two more signals found by the Australian Defence Vessel Ocean Shield.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said on Wednesday he appreciated Australia's efforts in the search when talking with the visiting Australian prime minister, who is in China to attend the annual conference of the Boao Forum for Asia.

Li said the international cooperation showed countries in the region are capable of handling challenges with concerted efforts.

The plane disappeared on March 8 while flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board, including 154 Chinese passengers.

The plane's black box, or flight recorder, could be used to solve the mystery of why the plane veered so far off course.