I'm not entirely sure belavia is even profitable in the first place
The only things in Belarus that are profitable are IT companies. Which BTW brings up a question of big international corporations outsourcing to authoritarian countries. Should they be punished financially for being complicit in breaking human rights?
The only way for bourgeoisie revolution to occur is to have bourgeoisie.
A dictator would be perfectly happy flogging peasants until the end of time, see north korea for reference.
>> At a meeting in Brussels, the leaders of the 27 member states also told EU airlines not to fly over Belarus, and promised further economic sanctions.
They told them to, but airlines are free to do whatever they want.
Obviously, the next step is to make it illegal to fly over Belarus.
Or prosecute airlines for endangering pasengers by doing this.
Or refuse to approve any flights with flightpath in Belarusian airspace.
EU gets to appear "tough" while, unfortunately, this is only going to hurt people of Belarus.
This is only going to help Lukashenko's narrative that the West is plotting against Belarus.
>> At a meeting in Brussels, the leaders of the 27 member states also told EU airlines not to fly over Belarus, and promised further economic sanctions.
They told them to, but airlines are free to do whatever they want.
Air France, Lufthansa, airBaltic & SAS already said they would not fly over belarus anymore
This is not exact, the EU ban decision is not taken yet. see link here: https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2021... "- calls on the Council to adopt the necessary measures to ban overflight of EU airspace by Belarusian airlines and prevent access to EU airports of flights operated by such airlines;" decision has still to be made by the council, and then - to my understanding - implemented by all m…
Thanks, thanks for revealing that I should trust journalism even less than I thought. I now noticed that > The EU has decided to ban Belarusian airlines from European skies has "decided" not "implemented" or "started", so technically it is matching reality, even if misleading.
"Cock-up before conspiracy": problem in this case is that journalists do not understand EU process. In fairness to them it is not straightforward and in any field of politics something is said to be "done" at many different junctures: for example when it is politically inevitable, when it is informally agreed, once it has been formally agreed and then, of course, once it has actually been effected.
But how often do Lukashenko and his circle actually fly out of Belarus anyway? He already had no problem with closing his own borders before anyway, so it's not like this is going to seem like a strong move to him and it only really hurts the Belarusian people.
They sanctioned individuals involved in the decision too. And at some point, the Belarusian people will have to take responsibility for their leaders. I'm not saying it should happen today or that they should start a civil war, but they should think about ways to change.
This is not exact, the EU ban decision is not taken yet. see link here: https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2021... "- calls on the Council to adopt the necessary measures to ban overflight of EU airspace by Belarusian airlines and prevent access to EU airports of flights operated by such airlines;" decision has still to be made by the council, and then - to my understanding - implemented by all m…
For all practical matters that is the same. Of course member states have to implement it. The EU is (still?) not one country.
What counts is that the leaders of all EU countries agreed to it. So it will happen.
But how often do Lukashenko and his circle actually fly out of Belarus anyway? He already had no problem with closing his own borders before anyway, so it's not like this is going to seem like a strong move to him and it only really hurts the Belarusian people.
Dictators never rule alone, even though they suck all the attention. They have supporters and enablers. For example, a pilot of that MiG-29 fighter jet could blow a passenger plane if ordered so. Their police killed and tortured people that were on mass protests. Lukashenko doesn't have exclusive responsibility over this.
>> At a meeting in Brussels, the leaders of the 27 member states also told EU airlines not to fly over Belarus, and promised further economic sanctions.
They told them to, but airlines are free to do whatever they want.
Possibly, I think it will depend on how individual countries implement the directive.
I think irrespective of that if airlines ignore such a directive then they'll be exposing themselves to a significant amount of liability if something happens again (i.e. the airline will be made to pay out damages and their insurance probably won't cover it).
EU gets to appear "tough" while, unfortunately, this is only going to hurt people of Belarus. This is only going to help Lukashenko's narrative that the West is plotting against Belarus.
Most people are not stupid, they understand the situation. Also most of the people do not believe Lukashenko's narratives any more. At this point is not about him convincing his people to believe him, it's about using force to remove those who are brave enough to fight him - this is actually what this kidnapping was about.