U.N. Report Detailing Belarus Diversion of Ryanair Flight Raises Fresh Questions

Ryanair

Chief Government

Michael O’Leary

and leaders of European nations have accused Belarus of fabricating the bomb scare to illegally pressure the aircraft to land in Minsk as a result of they knew dissident journalist Raman Pratasevich was onboard. The Boeing 737, carrying 126 passengers, was en route from Athens to Vilnius, Lithuania, when Belarus controllers instructed the pilots they’d obtained phrase of a bomb aboard.

Lithuania and Poland, the place the aircraft was registered, introduced prison probes of the occasions and the Federal Bureau of Investigation stated in Could it was cooperating with European counterparts as a result of U.S. residents had been on the flight.

Proof offered by Belarus within the spring to assist its declare of a bomb menace has been dismissed by the Irish airline and lots of governments. Belarus’s arrest of Mr. Pratasevich and actions surrounding the flight prompted the European Union to ban flights from Belarus and improve sanctions on the nation.

The 36 ICAO members that sit on its governing council will meet on Jan. 31 to resolve on additional actions by the group in response to the report’s findings, the U.N. physique stated Monday. The council may also assess a grievance from Belarus that restrictions and sanctions positioned on it following the incident had been illegal.

Of the report’s findings, among the many most notable is that Minsk air controllers instructed the Ryanair pilots that a number of airports had obtained the bomb menace. The report then paperwork that on the Sunday of the flight, no different airport was conscious of getting obtained a bomb menace, and so they solely discovered the emails days or even weeks later.

A conclusion more likely to be drawn by European governments is that Belarus knew different airports had obtained the menace as a result of it was despatched from Belarus, and never from the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, as Belarus stated. Hamas has denied involvement.

The report gives essentially the most detailed account but of what transpired on Could 23.

Throughout the flight, shortly after Minsk air controllers knowledgeable the Ryanair crew of the bomb menace, the pilots requested the place the menace got here from. The controller instructed them that “airport safety workers… knowledgeable they obtained e mail.” Pressed by the crew whether or not the safety workers had been in Greece or Lithuania, the controller replied, “…this e mail was shared to …a number of airports.”

Investigators stated they had been unable to ascertain how the Minsk air-traffic controller knew the e-mail had been despatched to different airports.

Belarus authorities say the e-mail was obtained at a generic “information@airport.by” handle of Minsk Airport that isn’t monitored on weekends. They instructed ICAO investigators it was flagged to safety workers on obligation by software program that scans for threatening wording, and the safety workers forwarded the menace to controllers inside minutes.

The speedy response reported by Belarus to ICAO contrasts sharply to responses at three different airports alongside the aircraft’s flight path that additionally obtained the e-mail.

An equivalent e mail was delivered concurrently to the Lithuanian airport authority’s “information” e mail field however was solely found the following morning, when the workweek started, in line with the report. One other e mail, despatched to the “remark” inbox of the airport in Sofia, Bulgaria, was found on that Tuesday by public relations workers.

Romanian authorities, performing on a request from investigators, two weeks later knowledgeable investigators that in addition they had obtained the menace e mail on the identical time on Could 23, in a “contact” mailbox.

Belarus authorities stated they obtained two emails containing equivalent details about the bomb menace, the primary despatched at 9:25 UTC, earlier than Minsk air-traffic management contacted the Ryanair plane to tell it of the menace, and a second one obtained at 9:56 UTC, after contact had already been made.

Whereas Belarus supplied copies of each emails, it didn’t present logs of the e-mail server or the recordsdata containing the messages of their unique format, which might have substantiated their authenticity. Belarus authorities stated these recordsdata had been erased according to their data-retention coverage.

ICAO investigators stated they had been solely in a position to verify that the second e mail had been obtained primarily based on data from the sender’s e mail server primarily based in Switzerland, including that “the receipt of the primary e mail is essential to elucidate the idea for the communication of the bomb menace by Minsk… to the flight crew.”

Belarus didn’t present ICAO with requested data together with telephone information that might have supplied a timeline for the way details about the preliminary bomb menace was obtained and communicated between Minsk airport and air-traffic management. The Belarus Division of Aviation declined to submit particulars together with the time-stamps and length of calls between workers, citing authorized protections within the Belarus structure that protects the confidentiality of personal residents’ telecommunication information.

Video footage from cameras on the plane parking stand and contained in the terminal, which might have proven the disembarkation and processing of the passengers, together with Mr. Pratasevich, had been additionally not supplied. Belarus authorities stated the information weren’t obtainable because of the size of time that had elapsed because the incident.

Investigators stated they weren’t supplied with a “passable rationale” as to why the information had not been preserved in mild of ongoing prison and different investigations associated to the incident.

The report additionally stated it was unable to fulfill with or interview the air-traffic controller who had contacted the Ryanair flight as a result of the worker had did not return to work after his summer time trip and that Belarus authorities had been unaware of his present whereabouts or any means to contact him.

Write to Daniel Michaels at daniel.michaels@wsj.com and Benjamin Katz at ben.katz@wsj.com