US charges Belarusian officials for diverting flight carrying dissident journalist

United States federal prosecutors charged four Belarus officials with piracy-related charges for diverting a RyanAir airplane mid-flight last year to arrest a journalist critical of the government.

Leonid Churo, the director of the state's air navigation agency, Belaeronavigatsia Republican Unitary Air Navigation Services Enterprise, and three others were indicted on one count of conspiracy to commit aircraft piracy, for calling in a fake bomb threat to Minsk air traffic control and then covering up the move by directing air traffic controllers to falsify incident reports about the passenger airplane's diversion.

"The defendants are based in Belarus and remain at large," a Thursday statement from the US Department of Justice said.