“It will continue to be like this” - Lukashenko about the landing of a plane with extremist Protasevich in Minsk
The message about the mining of an Irish plane that was flying over the territory of Belarus came from Switzerland.
President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko said this today, commenting on the detention of extremist blogger Roman Protasevich during an emergency landing in Minsk, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“What should we have done against the backdrop of a cascade of threats about mining our facilities. Every day, schools, universities, and enterprises are “mined.” In each case, we responded adequately to the information received. I would like to especially note that the signal about the mining of the plane was also received from abroad. From Switzerland. Moreover, the message arrived in Athens, Vilnius and Minsk at the same time,” Lukashenko said, speaking to deputies and civil activists of the country.
Previously, the management of the Minsk airport stated that the email about mining was signed by the Palestinian movement Hamas, but later this organization denied its involvement in the incident with the Irish plane.
“Hamas, not Hamas – it doesn’t matter today. The crew had time to make a decision. We had 123 passengers from different countries and 6 crew members at risk in the air. The Belarusian Nuclear Power Plant is located in the flight area. The plane turned around near it. What if suddenly... Is Chernobyl not enough for us? How would the United States react in such a situation, taking into account its sad experience? The point is not only and not so much in this fighter, which was raised absolutely according to all the rules.
Another thing that we are not talking about is that, on my order, all the nuclear plant’s defense systems, including air defense, were raised on alarm and instantly put on full alert. According to my official duties, I had to protect people, I thought about the security of the country. And understand a simple thing: if the plane was mined, and the terrorists wanted to blow it up, we would hardly have helped. But I could not allow the plane to fall on the heads of our people after only recently two military pilots were killed while flying the plane away from residential buildings. I acted legally to protect my people. This will continue to be the case,” Lukashenko said.
“Regardless of whether or not there were explosives on the plane, but if the relevant services had reported to me that there was a terrorist on board, I would have immediately given the order to land the plane and remove the scoundrel from the plane,” the Belarusian president added.
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