The Latvian airline AirBaltic has rerouted several flights leaving from Riga in order to avoid flying over Belarus following Sunday's incident where a Vilnius-bound flight was forced to land in Minsk.
“Yesterday, when mixed information was received about the diverted commercial flight to Minsk, as an immediate action, AirBaltic decided to avoid entering Belarus airspace until the situation becomes clearer or a decision is issued by the authorities,” Alise Briede, a spokeswoman for AirBaltic, informed LRT.lt on Monday.
According to the statement, the the flights BT410 from Riga to Odessa in Ukraine and BT724 from Riga to Tbilisi in Georgia were rerouted to avoid entering Belarus airspace.
“The safety and health of our passengers and employees is the main priority for the airline. Currently, AirBaltic is continuing to closely monitor the situation,” Briede added.
Meanwhile, Wizz Air has said that its flight from Kyiv to Tallinn has also changed course on Monday in order not to fly over Belarus.
“I can confirm that today’s KIEV-TLL (the Kyiv-Tallinn flight) has been rerouted and we are continuously monitoring and evaluating the situation,” Wizz Air corporate communications manager Andras Rado told BNS.
Read more: Belarus scrambles air force, diverts Vilnius-bound flight to Minsk to arrest dissident
On Sunday, a Ryanair flight from Athens to Vilnius was forced to change course just before crossing into Lithuanian airspace.
Belarus' opposition say that the flight was forced to land in Minsk to arrest one of its passengers, opposition activist and journalist Raman Pratasevich.
Lithuania's authorities have strongly condemned the incident, calling it an “act of state terrorism”. Vilnius will seek that Belarus' airspace be closed to international flights, the government said.
Read more: Lithuania to demand Belarus airspace closed to international flights
Airlines that operate flights in Lithuania's airspace have yet to decide how to respond to incident, according to Mantas Kerdokas, the head of the Lithuanian Transport Competence Agency (TKA).
“Too little time has passed for airlines to change their behaviour themselves. One recommendation from an international aviation organisation came yesterday, recommending to avoid the Belarusian airspace. The issue should be raised at the European Council. Then there will be an agreement among countries,” Kerdokas told LRT.lt.
He also said that Lithuanian law enforcement and TKA specialists interviewed the crew of the Ryanair flight after it landed in Vilnius on Sunday night. However, he would not disclose the details of the interviews.
The UN’s International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) said on Sunday that the incident may have contravened a core aviation treaty, part of the international order created after World War Two.
“ICAO is strongly concerned by the apparent forced landing of a Ryanair flight and its passengers, which could be in contravention of the Chicago Convention,” it said.
“We look forward to more information being officially confirmed by the countries and operators concerned.”
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