MOSCOW, November 25. /TASS/. Russia urges Western countries to reconsider sanctions with regards to Belarusian aviation, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at a briefing on Thursday.
"We are urging the Western countries to review their approaches and lift their unjustified restrictive measures that they introduced against Belarusian aviation. One has to have some sort of honor," she said.
Earlier, the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) reported that it postponed its consideration of the Ryanair flight incident report until 2022 "due mainly to the volume of data submitted and additional State clarifications still being required." Initially, it was expected that the final report of the ICAO commission on establishing the facts related to the emergency landing of this flight in Minsk’s airport would be published on November 12. Its consideration is scheduled for the 225th session of the ICAO Council which will begin work in January 2022.
"These developments lead to quite definite conclusions: those who imposed sanctions on Belarus still cannot find convincing arguments to justify their policy with regards to Minsk. Apparently, they simply hope to use the results of the ICAO group’s work for this purpose," the diplomat noted.
On its part, Moscow hopes for the objectivity and impartiality of the group’s members, the spokeswoman stressed. "Against this background, the Belarusian side invariably displayed an interest in cooperating with the ICAO, readiness for open dialogue and it was doing so since the first minutes of the incident," she noted.
Following the incident with a Ryanair flight, EU leaders decided to block Belarusian airlines from landing at EU airports and flying over the EU’s territory, also advising European carriers to prohibit their airliners from flying into Belarusian airspace. Over 20 countries closed their airspace to the Belarusian air carrier.