Of course Lukashenko has the backing of Putin, so it is a slippery slope. I wonder how the EU will react. This is a major transgression.
If they really want to get this guy released and set a deterring precedent they would start playing hardball, which could include things like:
* Deny Belarus aircraft the right transit anywhere in the EU.
* Do so while some Belarus aircraft are on the ground in the EU and don't allow them to leave. This effectively holds those planes hostage as a bargaining chip, though it's really leverage on the Belarus airlines (and the planes themselves are probably leased). But it still creates problems for the regime.
* Refuse to allow the transit of any Belarus top officials anywhere in the EU. Start expanding this list daily to include more people and their direct families and make the directive permanent until the guy is released. Once you get the spouses of a couple dozen of the top people in the regime contemplating spending the rest of their lives without Italian vacations or Parisian shopping - much less just being able to go anywhere other than Russia - you're starting to cause some hard conversations about how much making an example of this guy is really worth.
Sadly, I doubt the EU will do any of this type of stuff but barring that, there's really no incremental cost to Belarus, nothing will happen and this guy is screwed.
Yes, nothing happened after another rigged elections, Apparently around 30000 people are still detained since August, since brutally stopped protests. Nothing will happen again, but Belarus should be declared as space not safe for air transit.
They've poisoned people with radioactive substances on NATO soil, without serious consequences. Just denials issued.
Putin keeps calling the west's bluff. Having a nuclear arsenal seems to let you do that.
Are the good guys allowed to do anything? Are we going to take a terrorist's family hostage to use them as as bargaining chip against the terrorist?
Hasn't this already been the case since November?
https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2020...
Restrictive measures include a travel ban and an asset freeze. The travel ban impedes those listed from entering or transiting through EU territories, while the asset freeze is used against the funds or economic resources of the listed persons. In addition, EU citizens and companies are forbidden from making funds available to the listed individuals and entities... Today's decision follows up on the agreement reached by the EU foreign affairs ministers at their video conference meeting on 19 November 2020. The sanctions will now apply with immediate effect... A second set of sanctions targeting Alexandr Lukashenko and 14 other officials was imposed on 6 November 2020.
I mean we can quibble about what constitutes "top officials" and the expansion is not daily - but it does exist and it is expanding.
The EU can severely damage the economy of Belarus by cutting off all trade and financial ties. And then work with the US to essentially destroy the country economically by cutting it off to nearly all global trade and financing. The only thing left to prop it up would be Russia and some Chinese imports; it would make Belarus a hermit state economically.
All the US has to do is say: we'll sanction any bank, corporation or person that does business with Belarus. Most will instantly capitulate, just as they did with Iran.
If the US asks Britain, Poland and Ukraine to suspend all trade ties to Belarus, they'll do it. Combine that with the EU members, and Belarus no longer functions in terms of having access to the global economy.
The downside to smashing Belarus in such a way, which would be very easy to do, is that it'll just throw Belarus into the hands of Russia entirely. Lukashenko knows that context with the West and has been playing the angles for a long time accordingly.
I'm sure that Belarus is in the same boat.
Sherlock Holmes's house in London is owned by Nazarbayev's daughter. It's so ironic.
Note that the EU did something similar: The forced Evo Morales to land in Vienna (on a flight from Moskow to Bolivia) because they suspected Snowden on the flight.
Since it was heading for Bolivia it obviously had enough fuel to go back to Moscow, if needed - for instance if Snowden had actually been onboard.
The thing that happened today (faked bomb alert and landing order accompanied with a fighter jet escort) is not on the same level.
Also lying (fake bomb threat) is a big difference.
It's like the difference between someone stealing your wallet, vs. letting you play some kind of street game where you don't actually have a chance of winning.
The method employed matters, it's not just about the final result.
Today's hijacking: the result was that the journalist was arrested and now may be facing the death penalty.
The denial of flyover rights to Morales' jet: there was no risk of capture to Snowden - worst case, he'd just have to back to Moscow. If he had been on the flight.
Yes, there was obvious BS from Morales' pilots about uncertain fuel readings - if that had been true the actions of those EU countries saved the life of Morales and others onboard.
Both situations are crap.
I see it like: egomaniacs running those 2 governments, bad.
They forced the plane to land by locking all airspace around it. And yes, they would also have started fighter jets if the plane would enter the forbidden airspace.