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Opponents of the authoritarian president of Belarus have arrested the founder of the messaging application channel, which was a key source of information after a plane was diverted to the capital, Minsk, due to a bomb threat.
According to the presidential press service, President Alexander Lukashenko has personally ordered a MiG-29 aircraft to fly with Ryanair – on Sunday to Athens, Greece, Vilnius, Lithuania – to Minsk airport.
The Belarusian Interior Ministry said Raman Pratasevich had been arrested at the airport. Pratasevich is the founder of the Nexta channel of the Telegram messaging app, which last year called Belarus a “extremist” to help organize major protests against Lukashenko.
Pratasevich, who fled the country to Poland, faces charges of up to 15 years in prison.
The presidential press service said the bomb threat was received when the plane was flying over Belarusian territory; officials said no explosives were found on the ship.
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda called on Belarus to release Protasevich.
“Unprecedented event! A civilian passenger plane bound for Vilnius was forcibly landed in #Minsk, ”Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said on Twitter.
“The Belarusian political activist and founder of @NEXTA_EN was on the plane. They have arrested him. The regime is behind the shameful act. I urge the release of Roman Protasevic as a matter of urgency!”
An unprecedented event! A civilian passenger plane bound for Vilnius landed by force #Minsk. Belarusian political activist and founder @NEXTA_EN he was on the plane. They arrested him. ???????? The regime is behind the shameful action. I demand the release of Roman Protasevič in a hurry!
– Gitanas Nausėda (@GitanasNauseda) May 23, 2021
He also called on NATO and the European Union to “react immediately to the threat posed by the Belarusian regime to international civil aviation” in a separate note from his office.
“I will speak at the EU summit in Brussels tomorrow,” Nausea said.
The European Union said on Sunday that all passengers aboard the Ryanair plane should be allowed to resume immediately.
“ALL passengers should immediately continue their journey to Vilnius and be assured of safety,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Twitter.
“Violations of international air transport rules must have consequences,” he added
Exiled opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya called on the International Civil Aviation Organization to begin an investigation.
“It is absolutely obvious that the special services operation is to hijack a plane to arrest activist and blogger Raman Pratasevich,” he said in a statement. “Not even a person flying over Belarus can be sure of their safety.”
Ryanair said the aircraft crew had been informed of a security threat to Belarus by the aircraft and was ordered to divert to the nearest Minsk airport.
The plane landed safely, unloaded passengers and carried out security checks by local authorities.
Tadeusz Giczan, a member of the Nexta group, said on Twitter that representatives of the Belarusian security agency were on the flight with Protasevich.
“Then, when the plane entered the Belarusian airspace, KGB officials started fighting with the Ryanair crew insisting that there was an IED,” he said.
Last year, 26-year-old Protasevich and 22-year-old co-founder Stepan Putilo, co-founder of Nexta, were added to the list of “participants in terrorist activities” in Belarus.
The two bloggers – who live in Poland – were added to the list on charges of creating massive unrest earlier over a 15-year prison sentence.
They are accused of sparking social hatred against government and law enforcement officials, and have been added to international wish lists in Belarus and Russia, which are allies of President Lukashenko.
Nexta Live and its sister channel Nexta – which has about two million subscribers to Telegram messaging – are prominent voices in the Belarusian opposition and have helped mobilize protesters.
In October, Belarus labeled the Nexta Telegram channel and its logo “extremist” and ordered a blockade. Re-submitting channel information is punishable by a fine.
The Baltic EU state granted Lithuania Protasevich refugee status as a result of bloody repression in Belarus following elections held last August. Tikhanovskaya also fled to Lithuania and is still there.
Belarus saw no precedent mass protests in August last year Lukashenko declared a sixth term in opposition to the opposition and Western diplomats said in a vote.
Police in riot gear stormed a rally on Friday, removing 30,000 protesters by truck.
Despite protests over the winter, Belarus has continued to take action against the opposition and the independent media. Last week, police arrested 11 employees of the TUT.by news website.
The EU and the United States have punished dozens of officials and companies associated with Lukashenko and his government with asset freezes and visa bans.
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