The countries of the collective West are reacting so violently to the incident with an emergency landing in Minsk of the Ryanair aircraft, since the Belarusian topic is now on its agenda.

This opinion was expressed by the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova on the air of Vesti FM radio station.

According to her, there are a sufficient number of examples when, on the initiative of Western governments, forced landing of planes and detention of third-country nationals were carried out, but usually these situations are ignored.

“About violent seizures, how they were arrested without trial or investigation, simply on the basis of materials planted by the special services or committed provocations, how people, citizens of third countries were transported from one country to another absolutely illegally ... This does not count at all there, it is a norm, a routine. .. And against this background, the West for some reason starts hysterical.

Why - we again understand: because Belarus is on the agenda, ”TASS quotes her.

On the eve of Zakharova, on her Facebook, she recalled that in 2013 in Austria, the plane of Evo Morales, who was then President of Bolivia, was subjected to a forced landing and search in Austria at the request of the United States, and in 2016, the Ukrainian authorities, shortly after takeoff, “deployed” the Belavia plane, after why the anti-Maidan activist Armen Martirosyan was removed from the flight.

In turn, the spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry Zhao Lijian called on all parties to "exercise restraint and avoid escalation" until all the facts and the true picture of the incident around the plane flying from Athens to Vilnius are established.

  • AFP

  • © Samuel Corum / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA

However, US President Joe Biden has already instructed his administration to "develop appropriate options" to prosecute those involved in the emergency landing of the Ryanair aircraft and in the detention of Roman Protasevich, one of the founders of the NEXTA Telegram channel.

This was reported by the press service of the White House.

According to the American leader, the forced change in the course of a commercial aircraft by Belarus and the arrest of Protasevich is "a direct violation of international norms."

He also supported calls for an international investigation to clarify all the circumstances of the incident and welcomed the decision of the leaders of the EU countries to introduce targeted economic sanctions and other measures against Belarus.

“This outrageous incident and the video, which Mr Protasevich appears to have made under duress, are a shameful attack on both political dissent and press freedom,” the press release said.

The incident also became the topic of a telephone conversation between the US national security adviser Jake Sullivan and the former presidential candidate of Belarus Svetlana Tikhanovskaya.

"Mr. Sullivan made it clear that the US, in coordination with the EU and other allies and partners, will bring the Lukashenka regime to justice," said Emily Horn, spokesman for the White House's National Security Council.

In turn, Tikhanovskaya in her Telegram channel said that she had invited the United States to discuss the situation in Belarus at the G7 summit in London and to hold a high-level international conference dedicated to this issue in the summer of 2021.

On the evening of May 24, the final statement of the EU summit on the Ryanair incident was released.

The leaders of the 27 countries of the union instructed the EU Council to take the necessary measures to ban flights of Belarusian airlines over the territory of the EU, and also recommended that European air carriers refuse to fly in the airspace of Belarus.

At the moment, it is known that the following airlines have refused to fly over Belarus: Latvian AirBaltic, Dutch KLM, Finnair Finnair, French Air France, German Lufthansa, Scandinavian SAS, Hungarian Wizz Air, Polish LOT, Spanish Iberia and Austrian Austrian Airlines.

The British authorities ordered their airlines to avoid the airspace of Belarus "for safety reasons."

Ukraine intends to stop air traffic with Belarus from midnight on May 26.

In turn, Belavia announced the cancellation of flights to London and Paris until October 30 in connection with the decision of the governments of Great Britain and France to ban flights.

  • RIA News

  • © Alexander Kryazhev

In addition, Brussels called for new sanctions against Minsk, demanded the release of Roman Protasevich and appealed to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) with a call to investigate the incident with the emergency landing of a passenger liner.

It also frozen the provision of investment assistance to Belarus in the amount of € 3 billion, "until the state becomes democratic."

“This is an attack on democracy, freedom of expression and the sovereignty of Europe,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said at a press conference.

In turn, the head of the European Council Charles Michel pointed out that the Belarusian authorities endangered the safety of civil aviation: “We do not accept attempts to play Russian roulette with the lives of innocent citizens.

What happened is unacceptable, our reaction is consistent with the seriousness of what happened. "

Let us remind you that on May 23, a Ryanair plane on a flight from Athens to Vilnius made an emergency landing at the Minsk national airport.

During the flight, the Ministry of Defense of Belarus received a message about the mining of an airplane.

According to the head of the aviation department of the Belarusian Ministry of Transport, Artyom Sikorsky, the letter came on behalf of the Hamas soldiers (later a representative of the Palestinian movement denied involvement in the incident).

According to him, the Belarusian authorities did not put pressure on the crew of the passenger plane.

No explosives were found during the inspection of the aircraft in Minsk.

The Investigative Committee of Belarus opened criminal proceedings on the fact of “knowingly false reporting of danger under Part 1 of Art.

340 of the Criminal Code ".

At the same time, after landing, one of the founders of the NEXTA Telegram channel recognized as extremist in the republic, Roman Protasevich, was detained.

He was wanted in the case of "organizing mass riots and group actions that grossly violate public order" and on the list of individuals involved in terrorism.

Protasevich faces up to 15 years in prison.

  • Roman Protasevich

  • Reuters

  • © Stringer

Later, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Belarus published a video with the detainee, during which he said that he had no health problems, that he was treated as correctly as possible: “I continue to cooperate with the investigation and give confessions on the fact of organizing riots in the city of Minsk”.

On the eve of the Belarusian authorities noted that the West is politicizing the incident with the Ryanair plane.

According to the press secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the republic, Anatoly Glaz, "the situation is directly and clearly aggravated."

“There are unconfirmed accusations, labels are glued.

At the same time, there is no apparent desire to understand it objectively.

Instead, the slogans of sanctions immediately resounded again.

We nevertheless urge those who have succumbed to this vicious practice to remember the rules and safety of passengers, to analyze everything calmly, to wait for the conclusions of competent experts.

After all, only on this basis one can draw at least some noteworthy conclusions, ”he said.

According to some reports, on Tuesday, May 25, President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko is to comment on the incident. This was reported by the "Pool of the First" Telegram channel.