The European Union has urged member states to urge them to close airspace and airports to Belarusian airlines. This comes after Belarus forced a civilian airliner to make an emergency landing in Minsk on Sunday and arrested an opposition blogger who criticized authoritarian President Lukashenko.
Some airlines, including Lufthansa, said in a statement earlier the same day that they would not fly over Russian airspace.
The EU has also called for an investigation into the incident and plans to impose sanctions on Belarusian officials who forced the plane to divert.
Many members of the Belarusian government have already been sanctioned by the EU following the crackdown in Belarus following last August’s disputed presidential election.
Both the EU and the U.S. have called on Lukashenko’s government to immediately release Raman Platasevich. The 26-year-old blogger has been living in exile in Poland.
Platasevic was the editor of the influential Telegram channels Nexta and Nexta Live. Belarusian authorities searched the plane and he was arrested by police. Minsk authorities said Lukashenko ordered the army to send an emergency MiG-29 fighter jet to supervise the passenger plane’s flight to Minsk airport.
Video footage broadcast Monday on Belarusian state television showed Platasevich “admitting” responsibility for charges of inciting the riots.
“I can say that I have no health problems …… I continue to cooperate with investigators and admit to organizing mass unrest in the city of Minsk.”
But just before he and his girlfriend were led off the forcibly diverted plane by police, Platasevich, shaking, reportedly told a passenger on the same flight, “I’m going to get the death penalty here.”
Ryanair flight FR4978, which had taken off from Athens, was asked to change course about 10 kilometers from its original destination – Vilnius, Lithuania – in Belarusian airspace, allegedly because of a bomb threat.
On Monday, Ryanair called the incident “an act of air piracy” and said it was cooperating with investigations by European Union security agencies and NATO.
In Washington, White House Press Secretary Chuckie described the role of the Belarusian government in the incident as “appalling” and said the U.S. had called for an international investigation. Belarus is a former Soviet republic with close ties to the Russian government.
“This is a blatant disregard for international peace and security by the regime,” Sharkey said.
A U.N. spokesman said Secretary-General Guterres supports “a full, transparent and independent investigation into this disturbing incident.”
The plane had a total of 126 passengers when it took off from Athens, but only 121 passengers landed in Vilnius. Six crew members were also on board the aircraft. Ryan CEO Michael O’Leary said he believed the plane had Belarusian operatives on board, who also disembarked in Minsk. This appears to indicate that the operation was coordinated with agents on the ground in Greece.
Last year, during the anti-Lukashenko protests surrounding election fraud, the Nexta channel became one of the main channels for protest organizers, and Minsk authorities subsequently charged Platasevich with terrorism and provoking riots.
Lukashenko won a sixth term in the August election, claiming to have received 80 percent of the vote. However, many in the country accused him of fraud.
More than 34,000 people were arrested and thousands were severely beaten in Belarus during the months of protests that followed.
Secretary of State John Blinken said Sunday that the United States “strongly condemns the forced diversion of a flight between two European Union member states and the subsequent removal and arrest of journalist Raman Platasevich in Minsk. We demand his immediate release.
In a statement, Blinken said, “This appalling act engaged in by the Lukashenko regime threatens the lives of more than 120 passengers, including U.S. citizens.”
The U.S.-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) on Sunday expressed “alarm” at the incident and said the Lukashenko government has “increasingly stifled the Belarusian press over the past year, arresting, fining and deporting journalists and sentencing them to increasingly long prison terms. “. The Committee to Protect Journalists has called for the immediate release of Platasevich.
Platasevich was in Athens covering a visit by Svetlana Tikhanovskaya before his arrest. Tikhanovskaya claims to be the exiled leader of Belarus due to massive fraud in last year’s elections. She called on the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) to investigate Sunday’s incident and the diversion of Ryanair’s jetliner.
She tweeted that Lukashenko’s “regime threatened the lives of the passengers on board. From now on – anyone flying over Belarus – can’t be guaranteed safety. There must be an international response!”
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