AFP reports
"During search operations in the sea carried out in the last 24 hours... the team on board the Alucia located parts of a plane," France's Bureau of Investigation and Analysis (BEA) said in a statement.
"These elements were identified by BEA investigators as belonging to the wreckage of the A330-203 plane, flight AF 447" that crashed, the statement said.
BEA Director Jean-Paul Troadec also told AFP that investigators have hope of finding the plane's black boxes because the debris area was relatively concentrated.
"The favourable news is that the debris area is relatively concentrated. And this gives us hope of finding the black boxes," he said.
Troadec said the parts of the wreckage that had been found consisted of "engines and certain elements of the wing."