MOSCOW/MINSK (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 23rd May, 2021) The Lithuanian Foreign Ministry on Sunday summoned Belarusian charge d'affaires and demanded immediate release of a Ryanair plane that made an emergency landing in Minsk airport.
Earlier in the day, the Belarusian Interior Ministry confirmed detention of Roman Protasevich, a founder of a Telegram channel that Minsk labeled extremist. According to human rights activists, Protasevich was on board a Ryanair flight from Athens to Vilnius. The plane had to make an emergency landing in Minsk over a bomb threat.
"On 23 May, the Belarusian Chargé d'affaires ad interim was summoned to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania and demanded an immediate release of all the passengers and the crew, who were being held at the Minsk Airport," the ministry said in a statement on its website.
Sputnik has just been told by Minsk airport that the plane is preparing for takeoff.
