DISINFO: The West is hyprocritical in condeming Belarus over a diverted plane
SUMMARY
The West has been hypocritical in condemning Belarus about the forced landing of Ryanair flight FR 4978. It tends to forget the previous case of the flight of Bolivian President Evo Morales, whose plane was forced in July 2013 to land in Vienna after US pressure because Washington thought that fugitive Edward Snowden was on board.
RESPONSE
This is a recurrent pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative about the arrest of a Belarusian opposition activist Raman Pratasevich.
The cited example of the aircraft landing with Evo Morales did not involve bomb scares or crackdowns on the political opposition. In July 2013, under the Obama administration, Bolivian President Evo Morales was forced to land in Austria, amid U.S. pressure, in a hunt for U.S. fugitive Edward Snowden, who was thought to be aboard. But unlike the Belarusian plot, European nations refused it permission to enter their airspace, Bolivian officials later told reporters, leaving them with no clear route back home after a trip to Moscow. The plane subsequently landed in Austria.
According to The Washington Post, some analysts see the arrest of the journalist Pratasevich as part of a more recent trend — what Freedom House, a nongovernmental, nonpartisan advocacy organisation, has dubbed “transnational repression.”
The EU condemned Belarusian action against civil plane and the detention of Pratasevich. In a declaration on behalf of the EU on the forced diversion of Ryanair flight FR4978 to Minsk on 23 May 2021, the High Representative called for the immediate release of Mr Pratasevich. This was followed by a European Council statement, in which the EU leaders called for targeted individual and economic sanctions as well as to ban overflight of EU airspace by Belarusian airlines and prevent access to EU airports of flights operated by these.
Read similar disinformation case alleging that forcing down aircraft is common practice among special forces.