“The ambassador was offered to leave Belarus within 24 hours.
All diplomatic and administrative-technical staff of the embassy were also asked to leave Belarus - within 48 hours.
Leave one administrative and technical employee here to take care of the building, ”Makei said.
The head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that “today the Latvian Ambassador was invited to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in connection with an incident that took place literally some time ago in Riga and was connected with the insult of the state flag of the Republic of Belarus”.
“It is very regrettable that, along with the mayor of Riga, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Latvia, a department that, in principle, should work not for separation, but for the rapprochement of peoples, took part in this incident,” the minister said.
He added that "a strong protest was made to the Ambassador in connection with this situation."
Earlier it was reported that the mayor of Riga Martins Stakis, together with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Latvia Edgar Rinkevich at the World Ice Hockey Championship, replaced the national flag of Belarus with the white-red-white flag, which was official in 1991-1995.
On May 23, a Ryanair plane en route Athens - Vilnius made an emergency landing in Minsk after reports of mining operations.
On board, Roman Protasevich, the creator of the NEXTA Telegram channel, which covered the protests against the presidential elections in Belarus in August 2020, was detained.
The European Union has summoned the Permanent Representative of Belarus because of the incident with Ryanair.