Belarus

MINSK, May 30. /TASS/: Opposition blogger Roman Protasevich, who was detained at an airport in Minsk, is in a detention facility of the Belarusian State Security Committee (KGB), and has received the first delivery from his relatives, the Vesna human rights center unregistered in the country said on its Telegram channel.

"Roman Protasevich has been transferred to the KGB detention facility," the report said on Sunday. "There is also information that the first delivery from his sister has arrived, but a book was taken away," it noted.

MINSK, May 28. /TASS/: Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has arrived in the Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi to hold talks with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, the Belarusian presidential press service said in a statement on Friday.

"Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko arrived on a working visit to Russia on May 28," the statement reads.

MINSK, May 26. /TASS/: The bomb threat against Ryanair's passenger airliner was received from Switzerland, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said in parliament at a meeting with legislators, members of the Constitutional Commission, and representatives of government agencies on Wednesday.

"The message that there was a bomb on board that plane came from Switzerland," the television broadcaster ATN's Telegam channel quotes Lukashenko as saying.

MINSK, May 26. /TASS/: Roman Protasevich detained at Minsk Airport is giving confessionary statements and disclosing information on the sponsors of subversive activity in Belarus, Chairman of the republic’s State Security Committee (KGB) Ivan Tertel said at a meeting of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko with lawmakers in the national parliament on Wednesday.

(Reuters) --- Airlines shunned Belarus's airspace on Tuesday and Belarusian planes faced a possible ban from Europe as international outrage mounted over Minsk forcing down a jetliner and arresting a dissident journalist who was on board.

A video released overnight showed 26-year-old Roman Protasevich confessing to having organised anti-government demonstrations. On Sunday he was pulled off a flight from Greece to Lithuania forced down in the Belarusian capital Minsk.

(Reuters) --- European leaders threatened to limit international air traffic over Belarus and possibly target its ground transport as well, after a Ryanair plane was forced to land in an incident denounced by Western countries as "state piracy".

Western leaders reached for the strongest language to condemn Sunday's incident, in which a Belarusian warplane intercepted a flight between Greece and Lithuania and forced it down in Minsk, where a dissident journalist was arrested.

MINSK, May 19. /TASS/: The Department of Internal Security of the Prosecutor General’s Office of Belarus initiated criminal cases over death threats and insults towards Prosecutor General Andrey Shved, the Office announced Wednesday.

MINSK, May 19. /TASS/: Two pilots were killed after a Yak-130 combat training plane of the Belarusian Air Force crashed near Baranovichi in the western Brest Region, the republic’s Defense Ministry reported on Wednesday.

"A Yak-130 military plane based out of the Lida assault aviation base has crashed near Baranovichi. Unfortunately, both pilots have died. There are no other victims or damage. The Emergencies Ministry’s forces have eliminated the consequences of the crash," the ministry said in a statement.

MINSK, May 13. /TASS/: Belarus plans to purchase and manufacture domestically Russia’s single-dose Sputnik Light coronavirus vaccine. Plans are also in store to launch the full production cycle of the Sputnik V vaccine this coming fall, Belarusian Health Minister Dmitry Pinevich said in an interview the SB Belarus Segodnya newspaper published on Thursday.

(Reuters) --- Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has signed a decree allowing the transfer of presidential power to the security council if he is murdered or otherwise unable to perform his duties, state Belta news agency reported on Saturday.

Lukashenko said in April he was planning to change the way power in Belarus is set up.

Previously, if the president’s position became vacant, or he was unable to fulfil his duties, power would be transferred to the prime minister until a new president took oath.