Scrutable

https://mobile.twitter.com/HannaLiubako ... 5207123972

Interesting.

Belarus 'diverts Ryanair flight to arrest journalist'

Or maybe the word they're looking for is "hijacks".

This is one to watch. The plane is registered in Poland, took off in Greec to go to Lithuania. All members of NATO. Ryanair is generally registered in Ireland, which is technically neutral. I haven't heard that it has taken off again yet either although the coverage is patchy. So be nice to know the citizenship of the passengers if they are still in Minsk.

I imagine a lot of people are having a bank holiday Sunday at odds with their plans.

Information on the flight here: https://onemileatatime.com/ryanair-bela ... diversion/

It looks like the flight was in Belorussian airspace at the time.

MINSK: UPDATE: The plane was intercepted and forced down by a military Mig-29 fighter jet after flight crew didn't buy the story that there were explosives on board.

https://twitter.com/KolHaolam/status/13 ... 73829?s=19

Edited to add:

What we know so far: KGB operatives boarded the plane in Athens this morning together with Roman Protasevich (he noticed dodgy-looking ppl taking pics of him at the gate). Then when the plane has entered Belarus airspace KGB officers initiated a fight with the Ryanair crew (1/2)

insisting there’s an IED onboard. Eventually the crew was forced to send out SOS (literally moments before the plane would've left Belarus airspace). MiG-29 took off and escorted it to Minsk. Security services entered the plane and arrested Protasevich. (2/2)

https://twitter.com/TadeuszGiczan/statu ... 17890?s=19

171 passengers, apparently, still there.

Per FR24, were at 39000 feet when diversion imposed. Normally or apparently approach descent for Vilnius starts before that point in the flight but I don't know what the weather was like. So not sure that matters.

Apparently due to take off again at 1800 UK time.

Techbro Twitter is all over this:

"Russia hijacked a plane"
- Er, Belarus actually
"But it says KGB agents"
- Yes, the Belarus secret police are still called the KGB. It's (Byelo)Russian for State Security Committee. There's only so many euphemistic acronyms you can make for the secret police
"And it was nearly at its destination in Latvia"
- Lithuania, actually. I know these places all sound like Sleeping Beauty lives there but these things matter.
"And it was Russia behind it anyway"
- Er, why?
"Because Putin is bad"

(FWIW I suspect Putin is either facepalming at this, or thinking "f.ck me, Lukashenko has balls, I'd never have tried a stunt like this".)

Possible there was some coordination between Putin and Lukashenka.

A few weeks ago Russia clamped down on an independent and critical media outlet: https://meduza.io/en/feature/2021/04/26 ... hat-s-next

As far as I remember a lot of the journalists had already fled Russia and were based in Lithuania.

Possible the latest is part of a coordinated attempt to shut down critical journalism.

sTeamTraen wrote: Sun May 23, 2021 7:34 pm
(FWIW I suspect Putin is either facepalming at this, or thinking "f.ck me, Lukashenko has balls, I'd never have tried a stunt like this".)

Yeah. Russia just shoot the planes out of the sky. None of this forced landing shite.

Ah, that's better, a stronger statement from Michael O'Leary today:
https://www.thejournal.ie/michael-olear ... 2-May2021/

Yesterday's Ryanair statement was a bit pathetic: https://twitter.com/RyanairPress/status ... 32/photo/1

I'm baffled that Dominic Raab should think it reasonable to describe the Lukashenko action as being "outlandish", as if it was merely some bizarre or 'strange' behaviour. It should be clearly called out as outrageous and totally unacceptable.

The only reason that I can think of why he would want to downplay the condemnation is because he wants to keep that sort of thing as an option for planes overflying UK airspace.

And, for this government, it wouldn't surprise me if they did it themselves.

headshot wrote: Sun May 23, 2021 9:31 pm

sTeamTraen wrote: Sun May 23, 2021 7:34 pm
(FWIW I suspect Putin is either facepalming at this, or thinking "f.ck me, Lukashenko has balls, I'd never have tried a stunt like this".)

Yeah. Russia just shoot the planes out of the sky. None of this forced landing shite.

Not an entirely unprecedented event.

I'm torn between being outraged at a state seemingly faking a hijacking, or at least a bomb threat, to force a plane to land so they can arrest a passenger, and thinking how the story would be presented if, say, the US had faked a reason to require a foreign overflight to land so they could arrest a suspected terrorist on board.

(Yes, I can see the difference between someone who might legitimately be labelled a terrorist and a journalist who gets labelled as a terrorist for daring to criticize the totalitarian regime, and obviously ones sympathies might very much depend on what type of ruse is used to oblige the plane to land. Telling them there's a bomb on board and they have to fly further than intended under fighter escort to your choice of landing place is not a good look.)

Suggestions for sanctions from the President of Lithuania:
https://twitter.com/gitanasnauseda/stat ... 68800?s=21

EU response, includes banning Belarus’ airline.
https://twitter.com/barendleyts/status/ ... 76224?s=21

Martin Y wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 1:58 pm I'm torn between being outraged at a state seemingly faking a hijacking, or at least a bomb threat, to force a plane to land so they can arrest a passenger, and thinking how the story would be presented if, say, the US had faked a reason to require a foreign overflight to land so they could arrest a suspected terrorist on board.

There is some comparison to the occasion the US asked Britain to hijack, as some might put it, an Iranian oil-tanker at Gibraltar, because they suspected it was taking oil to Syria.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%8 ... z_tensions

Brightonian wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 11:01 am Ah, that's better, a stronger statement from Michael O'Leary today:
https://www.thejournal.ie/michael-olear ... 2-May2021/

Yesterday's Ryanair statement was a bit pathetic: https://twitter.com/RyanairPress/status ... 32/photo/1

I thought Ryanair handled it pretty well, given that they are mostly in the cheap-flights-and-ham'n'cheese-panini business, and don't normally expect to have to deal with murderous dictators. When their statement came out on Sunday afternoon I don't think many other governments had yet reacted, and I don't expect their Sunday duty solicitor or press officer is paid enough to start calling for sanctions against foreign governments when most of the time they're there to handle cases where someone got drunk on the way back from Malaga. Presumably by Monday they had taken advice on what to say and beefed it up a bit.

sTeamTraen wrote: Tue May 25, 2021 11:15 pm

Brightonian wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 11:01 am Ah, that's better, a stronger statement from Michael O'Leary today:
https://www.thejournal.ie/michael-olear ... 2-May2021/

Yesterday's Ryanair statement was a bit pathetic: https://twitter.com/RyanairPress/status ... 32/photo/1

I thought Ryanair handled it pretty well, given that they are mostly in the cheap-flights-and-ham'n'cheese-panini business, and don't normally expect to have to deal with murderous dictators. When their statement came out on Sunday afternoon I don't think many other governments had yet reacted, and I don't expect their Sunday duty solicitor or press officer is paid enough to start calling for sanctions against foreign governments when most of the time they're there to handle cases where someone got drunk on the way back from Malaga. Presumably by Monday they had taken advice on what to say and beefed it up a bit.

There is that.

But also not wishing to antagonise the government that still holds the passengers and aircraft seems like a sensible strategy.

Of course there wasn’t a bomb onboard.

If there had been, Ryannair would have charged £99.99 carry-on bomb fee.

One of the things I find a bit odd is that they said this happened when they had nearly finished their transit of Belarus airspace. Assuming that is similar to flying over Belarus, that suggests to me they were already nearer to Vinius than Minsk, as Vilnius is only just over the border and Minsk is rather more centrally located in Belarus. And coming from Athens you'd only be flying over the western edge of Belarus.

^ Apparently the air traffic transcript shows that the bomb info was communicated to the pilot shortly after entering Belarus, but the conversation took a while. By the time the aircraft turned it was nearer to Vilnius than Minsk, but...

ATC: RYR 1TZ for your information, we have information from special services that you have bomb on board and it can be activated over Vilnius.

Pilot: 1TZ Standby.

Pilot. 09:31:17: Ok RYR 1TZ could you repeat the message?

ATC: RYR 1TZ, I say again we have information from special services that you have bomb on board. That bomb can be activated over Vilnius.

Pilot: Roger that, standby.

ATC: 09:31:42: RYR 1TZ for security reason we recommend you to land at UMMS.

IvanV wrote: Wed May 26, 2021 2:15 pm One of the things I find a bit odd is that they said this happened when they had nearly finished their transit of Belarus airspace. Assuming that is similar to flying over Belarus, that suggests to me they were already nearer to Vinius than Minsk, as Vilnius is only just over the border and Minsk is rather more centrally located in Belarus. And coming from Athens you'd only be flying over the western edge of Belarus.

https://mobile.twitter.com/flightradar2 ... 0733068289

A bit of a zoom out so that you can see more of Belarus.
The link is https://www.flightradar24.com/data/airc ... m#27cce9a2 but they tend to expire after a week if you're not a paid user.