UK suspends Belavia's operating permit and instructs its airlines to avoid airspace of Belarus
Source: Airlive
The transport secretary, Grant Shapps, said he has instructed the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) to request airlines avoid Belarusian airspace in order to keep passengers safe.
Link to tweet
Read more: https://www.airlive.net/breaking-uk-suspends-belavias-operating-permit-and-instructs-its-airlines-to-avoid-airspace-of-belarus/
dchill
(38,532 posts)Stuart G
(38,445 posts)Devil Child
(2,728 posts)Government sanctioned air-piracy needs a response.
Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin
(108,192 posts)RIGA, Latvia European leaders on Monday were taking steps to cut off air connections with Belarus, barring airlines from flying over the country a day after its leaders forced a commercial jet to land and arrested a dissident journalist.
British Transport Secretary Grant Shapps instructed his countrys civilian aviation authority to ask U.K. airlines to avoid Belarusian airspace to keep passengers safe, he wrote on Twitter. He said he had suspended permits for Belavia, Belaruss national carrier, to operate in Britain.
Britain joined countries including Lithuania, Ukraine and Latvia that have sought to avoid Belarusian airspace after a brazen incident with little international precedent.
European Union leaders discussed punishing measures, and investigators were seeking more details about an audacious effort by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to snag the founder of a prominent opposition outlet. The leader sent up a MiG-29 fighter jet to escort a Ryanair flight down to the ground in Minsk, a power play that set a fearsome precedent for journalists and political opponents, who now must fear flying through the airspace of repressive regimes, even if they are moving from one free capital to another.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/europe-moves-to-isolate-belarus-after-minsk-forces-airliner-to-land-and-detains-dissident/ar-AAKkwq8
IronLionZion
(45,528 posts)The world is a weird and dangerous place.
dalton99a
(81,570 posts)muriel_volestrangler
(101,361 posts)...
In an interview on Newstalk Breakfast, the Ryanair CEO, Michael OLeary, said that it appears the intent of the authorities was to remove a journalist and his travelling companion we believe there were some KGB agents offloaded at the airport as well.
OLearys remarks were the first official confirmation of reports that four other passengers had disembarked in Minsk after the emergency landing, driving speculation that Protasevich was being shadowed by the security services before the plane was forced to land. OLeary said he believed it was the first time such an incident had taken place with a European airline.
...
According to colleagues, Protasevich had sent them messages claiming he was being followed by a man in the departure lounge in Athens he suspected was a Belarusian KGB agent. The man was said to have been behind him in the queue to board. He was said to have tried to take a photo of his documents before asking Protasevich a stupid question in Russian and leaving.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/24/belarus-seizure-blogger-ryanair-flight-us-outcry
oldsoftie
(12,597 posts)There needs to be international punishment