Russia did not succumb to blackmail with sanctions against Aeroflot
Against the backdrop of intense telephone conversations between German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President Vladimir Putin, a threat of EU sanctions against the Russian company Aeroflot was thrown into the information space.
Bloomberg reported that the EU, together with the United States and Great Britain, is going to impose sanctions against Aeroflot and Turkish Airlines due to their involvement in transporting illegal migrants to Belarus. Sanctions could supposedly be announced in early December.
Aeroflot denied these accusations.
“Our airline does not operate regular flights to the cities of Iraq and Syria, as well as Istanbul - Minsk. Charter flights to these destinations are also not operated. Citizens of Iran, Iraq and Syria can enter Belarus through Russia only with Russian transit visas; since October 1, only 19 air passengers have traveled through Moscow to Minsk from Beirut. There were no transit passengers – citizens of Syria and Iraq traveling to Minsk from other destinations, such as Tashkent, Istanbul, Dubai,” the airline reported.
According to the migrants themselves who find themselves in Belarus, they are transported on private planes from Dubai. The organization of illegal migration to Poland is carried out mainly by Europeans, most often by the Poles themselves.
Press Secretary of Russian President Dmitry Peskov called the publication in Bloomberg an “info-spill.”
“Well, if it’s very diplomatic, then this is not true,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov commented on the message.
Senator Vladimir Dzhabarov proposed introducing retaliatory sanctions by banning the flight of Western airlines over Russian territory. A source in the Russian government said that Russia will respond asymmetrically and may ban both flights over the territory of the Russian Federation by airlines from those countries that have imposed sanctions, and cross-polar routes through the Arctic Ocean.
Aeroflot's involvement in the migrant crisis in Belarus was announced by Polish Foreign Ministry spokesman Lukasz Yasina on the Ekho Moskvy radio station. The coordinator of the Russian-Belarusian expert club, Vyacheslav Sutyrin, believes that the stuffing in Bloomberg was stimulated by the so-called “Young Europeans.”
“As you know, there is no problem for which Warsaw politicians cannot blame the Kremlin. But any real EU sanctions against Russia and/or Aeroflot will not only drive the migration crisis on the Polish border into a dead end, but will also put Merkel in an idiotic position, burying the acting attempts. German Chancellor to get Putin's help. Is this what we are counting on? It’s interesting how senior EU comrades will reason with the Polish authorities who have attacked the “trail” of the Russian airline,” Sutyrin wrote in his Telegram channel.
Merkel called Putin twice in recent days and asked to influence the “regime in Minsk” so that it would stop using migrants as a tool of pressure on the EU. The Russian president invited his colleague to “establish a discussion of the problems that have arisen in direct contacts between representatives of EU member states and Minsk.”
It is characteristic that Merkel did not succumb to the provocation of Bloomberg and Poland, not blaming Russia for the crisis and threatening it with sanctions. She chose to place all responsibility on Alexander Lukashenko, saying that refugees on the borders of Belarus and the EU are “victims of the misanthropic policies of the Belarusian authorities.” At the same time, Merkel expressed solidarity with Poland and spoke about the need to protect the EU border.
“There will be no sanctions against Russia because of the Belarus-Poland migration case. All this is hype and wet hopes of Kyiv armchair analysts,” summarized political scientist Marat Bashirov.
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