HELSINKI (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 27th May, 2021) A flight of Belarus's state airline Belavia landed on Thursday in the Estonian capital of Tallinn as scheduled, despite the flight ban proposed earlier by the EU leaders, according to the Tallinn Airport said.
European leaders on Monday agreed to ban Belarusian airlines from entering EU air space and recommended the bloc's airlines refrain from flying over the Eastern European country in the wake of the Ryanair incident. Countries like Poland, Latvia, Sweden, Lithuania, Sweden and Finland have already banned flights from Belarus, leaving Estonia the only one in the region that has not done so, according to the news website Delfi.
"The Belavia flight from Minsk to Tallinn arrived as scheduled and soon went back," the airport said in a statement.
Meanwhile, Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas promised that Belavia will not be able to land in the country's airports.
"Position of [the Estonian government]: #Belavia flights will not be accepted in Estonian airports, official decision later today. Belarusian government has to take responsibility for its actions," Kallas tweeted.
On Sunday, a flight by the Irish airline Ryanair from Athens to Vilnius was grounded in Minsk over a bomb threat which later turned out to have been false. Among the passengers was Roman Protasevich, one of the founders of the Telegram channel Nexta, which was active during last year's post-election protests. The journalist was detained during the stopover. The incident provoked an outcry from Western politicians and officials.
