EU leaders agree on Belarus sanctions after plane diversion

The European Union called out the Belarus government for its brazen “hijacking” of the Ryanair jetliner flying from Greece to Lithuania on Sunday to arrest an opposition journalist.

The European Union agreed Monday to impose sanctions against Belarus, including banning its airlines from using the airspace and airports of the 27-nation bloc, amid fury over the forced diversion of a passenger jet to arrest an opposition journalist. In what EU leaders have called a brazen “hijacking” of the Ryanair jetliner flying from Greece to Lithuania on Sunday, they also demanded the immediate release of the journalist, Raman Pratasevich, a key foe of authoritarian Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko. A brief video clip of Pratasevich, who ran a popular messaging app that played a key role in helping organize massive protests against Lukashenko, was shown on Belarusian state television Monday night, a day after he was removed from the Ryanair flight.