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May 24, 2021 The order to land in Minsk the Ryanair plane traveling from Athens to Vilnius was given yesterday "personally" by President Aleksandr Lukashenko following a bomb scare: the state media of Belarus reported this. by the Belta news agency.
During the unexpected stop, which lasted hours, following the flanking of a Mig-29 fighter aircraft, Roman Protasevich, 26, journalist and co-founder of Nexta, a newspaper that it broadcasts on Telegram criticism of the Lukashenko government, which has been in power in Minsk since the 1990s.
According to Belta, who does not cite any judicial measures, no explosives were found on board the plane. The aircraft then left for Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, where it arrived about six hours later than the scheduled time.
On the episode, which involved a flight within the EU, representatives of the European Union spoke. According to the president of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, that of the Belarusian government was "irresponsible and illegal behavior" and "there will be consequences". The US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said of a "shocking act". According to the executive, Washington "is coordinating" with its allies "on the next steps".