Moon of Alabama Brecht quote
June 02, 2021

Timeline, Narrative Control And Consequences Of The Ryanair Incident In Belarus

(Amended at the very end on June 3 4:00 utc.)

The fallout from the bomb threat against the Ryanair flight 4978 from Greece to Lithuania continues to hit people who were not at all involved in the incident. That is sad as the 'western' perception of the case is based on a completely false narrative which was planted by foreign paid 'activists' who aim for regime-change in Russia and Belarus.

While previous Moon of Alabama posts, listed at the end of this one, went into the details of the case this one will present a broader timeline of the event and look at some of the involved characters and organizations. It will be the reference thread for possible future posts.

Frank Viacorka is a non-resident fellow of the NATO lobby Atlantic Council. His Wilson Center biography says:

Franak Viačorka is a Belarusian journalist and media expert. Franak works as a digital media strategist at the U.S. Agency for Global Media (contractor). He has worked as a creative director for the Belarus service of Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty and Vice President for Digital Communication Network. Franak is a frequent speaker and an advocate for democracy and personal freedom. He graduated from American University in Washington D.C. (M.A.) and Warsaw University in Poland (B.A.).

Viacorka has long worked on regime changing Belarus. He was at the core of the U.S. financed organization Nexta who directed the protests in Belarus after its 2020 election.

Viacorka is currently assigned as the chief minder of the rather hapless Svyatlana Guiado-Tsikhanouskaya, an exiled English teacher and wannabe president of Belarus.

After the election the EU had imposed some sanctions on Belarus. But then the whole effort somehow stalled. On May 13 Viacorka was asked about this:

The first package of EU sanctions against Lukashenka’s entourage was adopted on October 2, 2020, the second — on November 6, and the third — on December 17. Since then, the fourth package is also expected to be adopted. However, five months later, there are no new EU sanctions. Why?

According to Franak Vyachorka, international affairs advisor to Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, there are countries where Belarus is first on the agenda. But, then, there are those with other priorities: the coronavirus pandemic, peace in the Balkans, or security in North Africa.

Some countries, especially in Southwest Europe, he says, “believe that the Belarusian issue has calmed down: the crisis is not solved, but there is no escalation. Therefore, the issues in Belarus are being solved more slowly.

In an interview on May 22 Guiado-Tsikhanouskaya also lamented about the situation:

“Europe did a great deal in the beginning and offered a great deal of moral support, and afterward, the question is how far and how quickly they could go in implementing aggressive actions against the regime,” she said. “Since December [2020], that is for six months, we have had no new concrete actions on sanctions or movement on more civil society assistance. We call on the European Union to be braver.”

The expected fourth wave of targeted European sanctions against Minsk regime officials lost steam as street protests across Belarus shrank in the face of cold weather and continued arrests and beatings.

On May 23 a bomb threat against a Ryanair flight from Greece to Lithuania was emailed to airports and authorities in Lithuania, Belarus and Greece. It is not known who has sent the email. The consequences it had may give us a hint as to the identity of it senders.

Belarus Air Traffic Control, through whose airspace the plane was flying at that time, contacted the pilot, informed him of the threat and recommended landing the plane in Minsk. The pilot contacted Ryanair management and then decided to follow the advice. The plane landed at 10:15 utc (13:15 Belorussian time), the passengers disembarked and a lengthy bomb search was carried out. No bomb was found.

After landing, the aircraft, in accordance with the established international and national requirements in aviation security, was assigned to a special isolated parking lot, where the corresponding actions for inspection and interrogation were carried out in relation to the aircraft, crew, passengers, baggage, cargo, mail.

These actions are provided and must be performed by states in accordance with the Standards set out in Chapter 5 of Annex 17 to the Chicago Convention.

By 13.20 UTC all the procedures established by international and national legislation had been completed and the aircraft could take off, however the flight FR4978 departed from National Airport Minsk at 17.48 UTC and at 18.27 UTC made a safe landing at Vilnius airport.

Why the departure of the cleared plane was delayed so long has not been explained.

The passengers had to pass through passport controls. Two passengers were found to have outstanding arrest warrants against them and were detained. The other passengers flew to their original destination.

The handling of the bomb threat by Belarus was by the book. Such bomb threats against planes happen quite often and are handled by all local authorities in accordance with ICAO rules and regulations.

But just an hour after the plane had landed Frank Viacorka, who is followed by many 'blueticks' on Twitter, presented a narrative of the incident which strongly diverted from reality but allowed for a new push of the stalled regime change agenda.

Franak Viačorka @franakviacorka - 11:35 utc · May 23, 2021
BREAKING! The regime landed @Ryanair plane, which was flying from Athens to Vilnius,in order to arrest the famous Belarusian journalist Roman Protasevich. In Belarus, he faces the death penalty. Belarus has seized a plane,put passengers in danger, in order to repress an opponent

9,307 Retweets - 2,076 Quote Tweets - 17.5K Likes

The widely shared tweet and the ones following it implied that the Belorussian government ordered the plane down to arrest the regime change agent Protasevich.

When one looks into the details of the case it soon becomes obvious that the narrative is false.

The Foreign Minister of Belarus, Vladimir Makey, says the the authorities did not even know that Protasevich was on board:

According to the Belarusian top diplomat, the country’s authorities did not know that Roman Protasevich, one of the co-founders of the Nexta Telegram channel, which was recognized as extremist in Belarus, and his Russian girlfriend Sofia Sapega were among the passengers. "These two persons were detained after they had passed through customs and border control to board the plane after it had been checked. So, there are no links between these events. I think that we see deliberate attempts to link these things to the plane’s landing after a bomb threat," he stressed.

He rejected allegations that the plane’s landing had been organized by the Belarusian authorities to detain Protasevich. "I learned about the plane’s landing and the detention of these persons from the news," the minister noted. "Many officials, those who are in a position to know about such things, knew about the bomb threats but the detention was reported in the evening. Initially, we had no information about it."

Just eight hours after Frank Viacorka had planted the false narrative he proudly presented screenshots of the front pages of the Washington Post, New York Times, El Pais and Euronews to show how all 'western' media had taken up his fairy tale.

Franak Viačorka @franakviacorka @franakviacorka - 19:15 utc · May 23, 2021

The world is talking about Belarus. Lukashenka's military hijacked @Ryanair plane & took Belarusian journalist Raman Pratasevich hostage. From now on, no one can feel safe in Belarus airspace - the regime possesses total control over it & doesn't care about the legal obligations.

One aim of Viacorka and other anti-Russian agitators have is to impose sanctions against Belarus and Russia. A day after the flight incident the former oligarch and tax evader Mikhail Khodorkovski made a big push:

Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a former oil tycoon who fell foul of Vladimir Putin's Kremlin, said European countries should punish Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko for his act of air "piracy" by sanctioning oil and potash producers.

"Roman Protasevich must be freed and the dictator punished," Khodorkovsky said in a statement to Reuters. "The dictator should be hit where it hurts the most: his wallet."

"European countries should join U.S. sanctions against Belneftekhim and sanction Belaruskali," Khodorkovsky said. Belneftekhim is Belarus's state oil company. Belaruskali is one of the world's largest producers of potash.

European leaders threatened on Monday to limit international air traffic over Belarus and possibly restrict its ground transport, after a Ryanair passenger plane was forced to land in an incident denounced by Western countries as "state piracy".

Viacorka's false narrative has had for now the desired outcome. As Foreign Policy headlined yesterday:

Lukashenko’s Air Piracy Has Revitalized Belarus’s Opposition
An exhausted movement finds new support abroad.

But that will only hold if the narrative Viacorka provided will not fall apart.

On May 25, just 48 hours after the incident had happened, the Aviation Directorate of Belarus published a complete record of what had happened in Russian and English language. It also included the transcript of the radio traffic between the Air Traffic Controller (ATC) and the pilot.

On May 23, 2021, a written message with the following content in English was sent to the e-mail of the National Airport Minsk from the e-mail address protonmail.com:

“We, Hamas soldiers, demand that Israel cease fire in the Gaza Strip. We demand that the European Union abandon its support for Israel in this war. We know that the participants of Delphi Economic Forum are returning home on May 23 via flight FR4978. A bomb has been planted onto this aircraft. If you don’t meet our demands the bomb will explode on May 23 over Vilnius. Allahu Akbar.”

Taking into account the seriousness of the threat received, the information from the National Airport Minsk was forwarded to the relevant air traffic control services of Belaeronavigatsia State-Owned-Enterprise.

In accordance with the requirements of the Annex 17 to the Chicago Convention and the National Program for the Protection of Civil Aviation from Acts of Unlawful Interference in the Republic of Belarus, a response actions mechanism was put into effect in connection with acts of unlawful interference in the civil aviation activity.

The report by the aviation administration threatened to destroy the regime changer's narrative.

To keep that narrative alive Mikhail Khodorkovsky pulled some strings.

On May 26 the Dossier Center, an anti-Russian outlet in London financed by Khodorkovsky, threw doubt on the official report. It published a short report which insinuated that a copy of the bomb threat email, which Belarus had said started the incident, had been received only after the plane had diverted to Minsk.

The Dossier Center is little known so we first need to learn a bit about this organization. In July 2018 AP profiled it:

Over the past three months, a handful of highly placed Russians have discovered their secrets seeping onto the web.
....
A key source for the recent stories has been Russian opposition figure Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s new project, dubbed the Dossier Center . Launched in November, the center is billed as an investigative unit. Its website features a sprawling, interactive diagram of interconnected Russian officials described as the “main beneficiaries” of Russian corruption.

“We have no shortage of material we’re currently evaluating,” Khodorkovsky said in a television interview last week from his office in central London.

The exiled former energy executive is funding the Dossier Center himself and said it was born out of frustration with the inability of journalistic investigations to lead to real change in a Russia dominated by his foe, President Vladimir Putin. He wanted the project to produce more than occasional stories and to gather enough actionable information on the Kremlin’s leadership to bring its members, eventually, to court.

AP notes that the center is using very shady sources:

The provenance of the Dossier Center’s data remains a mystery. Khodorkovsky said some of his sources — the ones that asked for money — identified themselves, but many others didn’t. At least one of the Russians exposed by the center’s work, Veselnitskaya, has alleged the emails Khodorkovsky’s group relied on had been hacked.

In September 2020 the American Conservative noted the role the Dossier Center had played in promoting baseless Russiagate claims:

Elites charge Trump with being under the sway of those in Moscow, but they're guilty of the exact same thing.

There is no need to dwell further on Khodorkovsky’s biography, except to underscore exactly who he is: an exiled Russian oligarch with an active stake in Russian politics. Khodorkovsky is, today, arguably the world’s leading benefactor of anti-Kremlin efforts. But his operations extend far beyond Russia’s borders—in fact, he is deeply invested in lobbying foreign governments to adopt a hardline stance against the Kremlin. Beginning with his Open Russia Foundation, Khodorkovsky established a growing list of proxy groups—among them, think tanks, news outlets, and NGO’s—to marshal Western support for regime change in Russia.

Then came the 2016 election. In the months following Donald Trump’s blowout November victory, the contours of the Russiagate narrative began to take shape
...
The Dossier Center is only the tip of a sophisticated influence operation, helmed by an interconnected web of think tanks working to shape U.S. foreign policy. There is the previously-mentioned Open Russia Foundation, the umbrella organization used by Khodorkovsky to funnel money toward his numerous media, education, and activism projects. The Institute of Modern Russia (IMR), nominally headed by Khodorkovsky’s son Pavel, comprises one part of his reach in the Washington D.C. think tank orbit. Open Russia is also associated with the D.C.-based think tank Free Russia Foundation, through their shared work with Russian opposition movement “Living Politics” (Zhivaya Politika) and close professional cooperation.

These groups are linked by a revolving door of staffers who are regularly shuffled between the three and often occupy multiple roles. Take, for instance, Vladimir Vladimirovich Kara-Murza, a prominent Russian opposition figure and Khodorkovsky associate who serves as vice-chairman of Open Russia, senior advisor to IMR, and vice president of Free Russia. There is a strong research continuity between these groups, partly because they share an overlapping pool of authors. A typical example is journalist Michael Weiss, who was a research fellow at IMR before becoming “director of special investigations” for Free Russia.

It was the neo-conservative 'journalist' Michael Weiss who wrote an English version of the Dossier Center claims published by the Daily Beast.

The Dossier Center claims (machine translation):

On May 23, at 12:25 pm Belarusian time, the administration of the “Lithuanian Airports” received a letter with a threat of a bomb explosion on board the flight FR4978, sent from the address [email protected].
...
At 12:47 the plane changed course and flew towards Minsk. The official statement of the Aviation Directorate of the Ministry of Transport of Belarus did not disclose details about the time of receipt of the email, but Dossier found out that a copy of the letter from user Ahmed Yurlanov came to the email of the National Airport of Minsk ([email protected]) at 12:57 pm Belarusian time - that is, almost half an hour after the transmission of the message about the possible mining of the side.

Note that Dossier Center does not directly claim that Minks did not receive a copy of an email sent at 12:25 local time to Lithuania. It just claims that Minsk receive a copy of that email at 12:47 and presents a screenshot of that email. This is obfuscation as it does not exclude that Minsk received the 12:25 email which was obviously the base on which Minsk acted.

The headline the Daily Beast used, ‘Bomb Threat' That Justified Belarus Hijacking Came 24 Minutes After, is thus false as that is not what the Dossier Center claims.

The question is did or didn't Minsk receive the 12:25 email. The Dossier Center does not answer that question. In an interview published on May 26 Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko said that the first email was sent to three recipients:

In the case with the Athens-Vilnius flight a bomb threat came from abroad - from Switzerland, the president said. The message was sent to the airports of Athens, Vilnius and Minsk simultaneously. Belarus promptly communicated the information to the crew of the plane in accordance with international rules.

That again debunked the narrative which Frank Viacorka and Khodorkovsky's Dossier Center tried to plant and to keep alive.

New help for them came in form a mealy mouthed May 27 statement by ProtonMail, the anonymous email provider through which the bomb threat emails had been sent:

An email cited by Belarusian authorities containing a purported in-flight bomb threat was sent after a plane was diverted to Minsk with a prominent Belarus opposition journalist aboard, Swiss email provider ProtonMail said Thursday, further challenging the Belarusian regime's version of events.
...
“We haven’t seen credible evidence that the Belarusian claims are true,” ProtonMail, a privacy-focused provider, said in a statement. “We will support European authorities in their investigations upon receiving a legal request.”

A European intelligence official shared a copy of the email with The Washington Post. The time stamp on the email indicates it was sent 24 minutes after the Ryanair flight crew was ordered by Belarusian air traffic control to land in Minsk, despite the plane being much closer to Vilnius’s airport at the time.

In Twitter discussions with ProtonMail, which admits that two bomb threat emails were sent at different times, I have tried to clear up the issues. ProtonMail seems to insist that the first email was not received in Minsk but the company refuses to resolve the issue and to show evidence for this highly dubious claim:

The only email sent to Belarus was published by dossier.center to demonstrate that the “bomb threat” was sent after Ryanair flight 4978 was redirected.

ProtonMail is using linguistic hairsplitting in making that claim. "Sent to:" and "Copy to:" are typical entry field in email client software. The first email seems to have been "Sent to:" Lithuania with a "Copy to:" Belarus and Greece. The second email was "Sent to": Belarus with unknown, if any, "Copy to:" entries.

ProtonMail's anonymous service had been used for several criminal threats against entities in Russia and Belarus and both countries have blocked access to it. ProtonMail does not like that. Together with its sister companies it has actively supported 'western' regime-change efforts in Hong Kong and Belarus. Previously two Swiss encryption providers had been busted as being controlled by the CIA. Judging from its behavior ProtonMail might well be a third one.

On May 27 the Director of the Directorate of Aviation in Belarus has sent a letter to the International Civil Aviation Organization. It clearly states that Minsk received two emails:

Currently in Belarus, as required by the National Programme for the Protection of Civil Aviation from Acts of Unlawful Interference, an ad-hoc commission is investigating circumstances of the event. I would like to present preliminary results of its work to you.

As we informed earlier, on May 23, 2021 at 09.25 UTC and at 09.56 UTC a message in English was received at Minsk Airport e-mail address from protonmail.com, which we already cited.

That directly contradicts ProtonMail's claim and again destroys the regime changer's narrative.

Unfortunately that narrative is now ingrained in 'western' media reporting. It will however not withstand a diligent investigation.

Belarus has asked the ICAO to investigate the unlawful interference with the Ryanair flight. The ICAO has agreed to do so. Results are expected at the end of June.

A day after the Dossier Center had published the dubious email claim Mikhail Khodorkovsky seemed to get cold feet. He suddenly closed down his influence organization in Russia:

Open Russia, an organization founded by disgraced former oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, is to close its operations and shut its regional offices over concerns its members and supporters may soon be targeted for prosecution.

The move comes as the group’s executive director, Andrey Pivovarov, says the Russian government’s plan to strengthen the law on foreign “undesirable” organizations could lead to people involved being targeted by the courts.
...
“All members of Open Russia have been expelled from the organization, and their membership has been revoked to avoid possible prosecution. We don’t need any new fines or criminal cases, and we want to protect our supporters,” Pivovarov explained to Moscow daily Kommersant.

On May 29 the Presidents of Russia and Belarus met in Sochi:

Putin agreed with Lukashenko's opinion that the reaction to the Ryanair landing demonstrated an "emotional outburst," and added there were many other common fields of interest both leaders could discuss, according to the statement.
...
Lukashenko in turn told the Russian leader he would show him documents related to the recent emergency landing of the Ryanair flight.

"There has been an attempt to stir up the situation so it would end up being similar to that of August last year... It is simply clear what these Western friends want from us," he said, speaking of mass election protests in Belarus in 2020.

Some of the documents Lukashenko provided might have been related to Khorkovsky's activities. Russia now seems to have gone for a full bust of those.

On June 1 Andrey Pivovarov, who had run Khorkovsky's operations in Russia, tried to leave the country:

Andrey Pivovarov, the former director of the dissolved Open Russia organization, is in police custody after being arrested on Monday night. He is suspected of cooperating with a foreign NGO officially listed as 'undesirable.'

Pivovarov was pulled off an international flight to Warsaw, Poland at St. Peterburg’s Pulkovo Airport before the aircraft had the chance to take off. According to the activist, the plane had to be stopped on the runway for him to be detained. He was then taken to an Investigative Committee office to be interrogated.
...
Pivovarov now stands accused of sharing a Facebook post of another organization. The activist shared a notification from the ‘United Democrats’ in August last year, while in Krasnodar. United Democrats is a group formed in 2018 to support independent anti-Kremlin political candidates who wish to run for local office. Although it is also not listed as undesirable, it has previously been linked by Russian authorities to the British branch of Open Russia.
...
A day later, on Tuesday, three other opposition figures said that their property was being searched. The lawyers of another former head of Open Russia, Alexander Solovyov revealed he was being investigated as part of a case about the non-payment of debt on a non-residential premises. Some sources have suggested that he is considered a witness.

On Monday May 24, just a day after the Ryanair incident and with few if any details of the case known, the EU had urged its airlines to avoid Belorussian airspace. The fall out from that nonsense continues to hurt various airlines and their passengers:

Germany has blocked flights operated by Russian airlines from arriving in its territory in tit-for-tat action after Moscow failed to provide authorizations for Lufthansa, the transport ministry said Wednesday, amid tensions over Belarus.

Two Russia-bound Lufthansa flights that were due to depart earlier Wednesday from Germany had to be canceled because Russian authorities did not provide the necessary permits for them in time, said the ministry.

"Due to the reciprocal practice, the Federal Aviation Authority also did not issue any further permits for flights operated by Russian airlines as long as authorizations are pending on the Russian side," it added.

Three Aeroflot flights were affected by the cancellations on Tuesday and another four on Wednesday, said the ministry.
...
While the ministry did not specify the reason for the blockade by Russian authorities, some flights operated by European airlines including Air France were canceled last week after Moscow rejected flight plans that would have skipped Belarusian airspace.

Lufthansa has confirmed that it is no longer flying over Belarus after the EU urged airlines to avoid the country's airspace.

I am confident that the ICAO report will show that Belarus' version of the issue is the correct one.  That is unless 'western' members will are successful with their attempts  to influence and to fudge it.

Added June 3 4:00 utc:

The Belorussian ONT TV channel has uploaded a 55 minutes long documentation of the incident with lots of original footage. It is in Russian but if you switch on Close Caption and select Settings->Autotranslate to English you will get the gist.

´
bigger

The video includes:

  • The email received at 12:25 is shown in a Mozilla Thunderbird frame (above) at 2:27 min into the video.
  • Original MAYDAY radio traffic at 6:03 min.
  • 21:xx min Passengers, including Protasevich, pass through bomb scanner. Nothing abnormal.
  • 25:xx min Protasevich being questioned by police. Smoking, joking, no torture.
  • 31:30 min Two similar bomb threat emails shown in Thunderbird. One received at 12:25 the other at 12:56.

The video confirms many of the details as well as the larger perspective of the above take.

---
Previous Moon of Alabama post on the Ryanair incident in Belarus:

Posted by b on June 2, 2021 at 18:39 UTC | Permalink

Comments
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If this was a false flag operation designed to bring support and attention to the Belarusian regime changers, then it has been an absolute disaster because all it has done is deliver Belarus to Russia on a silver platter.

Lukashenko tried to steer a middle line between Europe/Russia/US leveraging the situation as needed for Belarus. No he simply has no choice. It’s either Russia or he becomes another Yanukovich

Posted by: Down South | Jun 2 2021 18:56 utc | 1

Thanks again, b, for your outstanding reportage on this event. Numerous other events are tied to it, like the Danish/EU spying scandal which provides an explanation for the similar reaction by EU nations, as well as the recent escalation in rhetoric aimed at the Outlaw US Empire and its EU vassals as shown by this and this, where Russian and Chinese responses to sanctions may become asymmetrical, i.e., Hybrid War Counterattacks that go beyond mere diplomacy.

For me, it's quite clear that the Outlaw US Empire's the responsible actor, resulting in cementing its position on Russia's roster of Unfriendly Nations. Also, Belarus is now firmly placed within the Union Treaty which will see it assume its previous SSR status. I also believe that Biden has zero control over the Regime Change Department, which appears to be acting upon a set of standing orders to do all it can short of war to destabilize Russia, China, and their allies.

Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 2 2021 19:17 utc | 2

Posted by: Down South | Jun 2 2021 18:56 utc | 1

I'm sure he would rather be friends with Russia the other has no future;-)

Posted by: jo6pac | Jun 2 2021 19:22 utc | 3

excellent coverage b.. thank you... this skripal-navalny-guaido type narrative has all the same fingerprints and all the same incentive - regime change, or financial sanctions.. it really revolves around the topic of money which our new poster max, along with psychohistorian and others here are adamant is driving all this.. i happen to agree... i don't expect the mockingbird press as william gruff likes to call it) is going to act any different when the report from ICAO becomes known.. has it mattered that the chemical weapons douma attack has completely fallen apart mattered?? not to the average person who doesn't have the time to pay attention to these types of details.. they are knee jerked by the quick ready made narrative and forget when the facts come out later to dismantle these ongoing narratives...

keep up the great work... ditto the regular and new posters here too.. thanks..

Posted by: james | Jun 2 2021 19:24 utc | 4

Down South @1--

It's not just about Lukashenko; it's about the fate of both the Belarussian and Russian people as they are the ones being attacked by the Hybrid War being waged against them. That's the basic reason for the response escalation that ought to be seen as very serious since Russia usually doesn't make threats; and when it does as now, it doesn't provide any additional warning. Hell, Lavrov's been saying for over 4 years that something like this would occur if the West failed to cease its actions. IMO, Russia and China have made it clear that their patience is at an end.

Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 2 2021 19:26 utc | 5

This is great work and very important too, many thanks. At times I disagree vehemently with b, but this is a shining example of what I expect from MOA, top level journalism.

To me it is pretty clear this is hybrid warfare, an asymmetric response is to be expected.

Posted by: Norwegian | Jun 2 2021 19:39 utc | 7

"Previously two Swiss encryption providers had been busted as being controlled by the CIA. Judging from its behavior ProtonMail might well be a third one."

MoA will likely be sued into bankruptcy by Protonmail for this totally baseless claim. If Protonmail were a CIA front, they most likely wouldn't act like this. Crypto AG always maintained its 'neutrality'. The Protonmail founder, an American-Taiwanese guy, is simply a bit naive and thinks he is fighting for freedom and democracy.

Anyway, MoA still hasn't published the first email, and nor did Minsk. Why not?? MoA simply claims Minsk was in CC. Without evidence, Protonmail's statement may well be correct.

Posted by: Tinman | Jun 2 2021 19:41 utc | 8

The quick Troll Poll confirms b's story's correct. Thanks Tinman!

Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 2 2021 19:49 utc | 9

To whom is this narrative directed? MSM audiences wouldn't be able to locate Belarus on a map, much less give a damn about it. Just another s***hole country. I guess it's just part of the relentless drip-drip of anti-Putin agitation.

Posted by: Patroklos | Jun 2 2021 19:58 utc | 10

I agree with others that this is a well composed chunk of professional journalism around the Belarus/Roman debacle.....thanks b

I hope this convoluted arrangement of resources will dispel the myth that the global private finance elite are bumbling idiots that can't plan nor execute shit.....at this point those folks may still be successful with their version of the history of these events in the public eye.....which MSM is going to buck the "trend"? And how soon before another event to bury this with narrative control like Skripals

Until and unless there is a breakdown in the functioning of the shit show, it will continue as planned and managed for centuries by the same elite.

While the Western public history of this event may remain managed, I think it will effect the supposed Putin/Biden meet....if I was Putin I would not leave my country for a bit....except maybe to China...

And then there is Occupied Palestine, Syria, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, NK, Ukraine, Venezuela and all the rest of the current friction points of empire control that all have hidden shit shows going on like b has shown so well here.

All the channels have the same shit show on them. I hope the shit show dies soon of its own internal contradictions and humanity can evolve beyond the barbarism part of our social structure the global private finance elite represent.

Posted by: psychohistorian | Jun 2 2021 20:01 utc | 11

... and the Pulitzer goes to....

Now I think it's a wag the dog type thing run by the locals to get wider support from the regime change network. But whatever, it's an anti-Russia frame job.

Posted by: gottlieb | Jun 2 2021 20:05 utc | 12

I'm half way watching a Belarus channel - ONT- program, too bad it is not subtitled, so far its layout is excellent with access to airport cameras, pilot and airport communications plus Roma appears in good spirits and even laughing at what he thought was a grand welcome, but the Belarus authorities did not have the passenger list so they were not aware -formally- of Roma being on board. According to the time frames the Belarus authorities found out about Roma's presence through the web going viral, a message of this guy Vyachorka -sounds like that- after receiving a pic from Sapega, Vyacherka draws a picture of the terrible dictator, the MIG29 which according to flight records was miles away, and the heroic journalist, that's how they found out, so they claim. I'll keep on watching the rest, Roma seems to be in good spirits claiming that he is well fed.

https://youtu.be/IF2DAEboPCE

Posted by: Paco | Jun 2 2021 20:07 utc | 13

@Mao Cheng Ji | Jun 2 2021 19:29 utc | 6
https://strana.ua/img/forall/u/11/33/photo_2021-06-02_21-07-08.jpg

That appears to be a photo of a screen with the second email (12:25), displayed in Mozilla Thunderbird. I use Mozilla Thunderbird myself, it seems a bit surprising to me that Belarus Airport authority would do the same. The font in the message text looks off to me, not the typical font I would expect to see in Thunderbird. But who knows.

Posted by: Norwegian | Jun 2 2021 20:08 utc | 14

@Norwegian,
12:25 is the second email? I thought it was the first email, the one everyone wanted to see.

As for the Thunderbird client, it's open-source, so I wouldn't be surprised if countries like Belarus and Russia preferred it to western proprietary software.

Posted by: Mao Cheng Ji | Jun 2 2021 20:24 utc | 15

Insightful. Thanks, b...

Nations (Belarus, China, Iran, Venezuela... ) with 100% state ownership of their Central Bank are under attack by the Global Financial Syndicate’s Financial Empire. Also, these nations are in the Non-$ Bloc. Russia is leading De-Dollarization.

The National Bank of the Republic of Belarus (NBRB) is 100% STATE OWNED and not private. It is “accountable to the President of the Republic of Belarus.” The Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV) is 100% state owned and same with the Central Bank of Iran (CBI). People's Bank of China (PBOC) is owned by State Council of the People's Republic of China.

Monetary Imperialism is following a ploy that it successfully implemented in Myanmar through Aung San Suu Kyi. The Central Bank of Myanmar was state owned and became an autonomous and independent regulatory body by the Central Bank of Myanmar Law which was enacted by the Myanmar Parliament in 2013. The Financial Empire has chosen Svetlana Tikhanovskaya for Belarus and Juan Guaidó for Venezuela, to implement what Aung San Suu Kyi did in Myanmar?

There exist a “Belarus Liberation Plan” that has been presented to the Financial Empire’s representatives in March, 2021 and discussed at Brookings Institutions. It called for its implementation from May to October of this year. When looking at the big picture, the Financial Empire is driving a REGIME CHANGE in Belarus. However, Belarus is Russia’s red line.

The Empire does ignite conflicts during Olympics at its adversaries, China (2008) and Russia (2014). China will be holding Winter Olympics in 2022. Will this Dollar Empire activate frozen conflicts in Belarus, Iran, Myanmar, Syria...? Is it also planning to create troubles in Russia before its September elections?

In April, Russian FSB detained two individuals plotting coup in Belarus, assassination of Lukashenko. “They planned to carry out a military coup in Belarus according to the worked-out scenario of "color revolutions" with the involvement of local and Ukrainian nationalists, as well as the physical elimination of President Alexander Lukashenko.” Putin-Biden talked about alleged the US-led assassination plot.

It is time for China and Russia to see the big picture and stand up to the Financial Empire or they will be captured.

Posted by: Max | Jun 2 2021 20:24 utc | 16

The narrative is in the hands of Belarus, they have the main character. Vyacherka mentioned by Roma, who smokes a lot but seems to be in good spirits.

Posted by: Paco | Jun 2 2021 20:29 utc | 17

@ Mao Cheng Ji | Jun 2 2021 19:29 utc | 6.. thanks for that.... hopefully b can embed in his thread here...

Posted by: james | Jun 2 2021 20:30 utc | 18

Thanks b. A clear timeline and a set of references at last.

****

Tinman | Jun 2 2021 19:41 utc | 8

The first email would have been similar to the second logically. The only known "published" screen-shot version came from "Dossier".

As Minsk would certainly have copies of the original files, all they have to do is wait and publish both of them when asked for during the ICAO investigation. THEY are the important factor - not the "Public". Although we have seen the biais of Judges from various countries becoming more and more evident (as in OPEC, "Douma") to downright criminal (re; Assange). This should not be a "secret" enquiry with half of the interested parties being excluded, as in MH17. The Belorussians and Minsk Airport should be able to give their testimonies in public.

****

One thing I would mention is that the Russian/Chinese "turn away from the west" is now in full swing. I do not expect any backing down on the multiple fronts (ie. as here or with the Chinese and the EU,). To close air traffic to Moscow, as the Germans are doing, will backfire if Russia decides to close more of it's airspace. The period of unilateral actions without any reciprocal pain are over.

****

Re; Pivovarov; The Russian and Belarussian Intelligence are clearly working closely together. Khodorkovsky has had previous experience, so it should be no surprise that he tried to close down his operations to hide how big they are, what their resources consist of and who is backing them. (Lukashenko's briefcase comes to mind)

Posted by: Stonebird | Jun 2 2021 20:35 utc | 19

@Tinman #8 comment

A quick internet search corroborates MoA's assertion about ProtonMail possibly being a CIA "honeypot".

Researchers have found ProtonMail is not fully protected encryption and emails can easily be read by ProtonMail itself. Further, it voluntarily complies with US laws and provides US intelligence agencies with unencrypted metadata via the Swiss MLAT treaty obligations.

So, if ProtonMail is not really secure and the metadata is readily available to US law enforcement then US intelligence agencies would know exactly when and where the email originated.

If the email had originated from within Belarus, then that info would certainly have been leaked to the western press by now and would be presented as evidence the email was simply a pretext by Belarus to ground the plane.

Since that has not happened, the metadata might actually incriminate a western country.

Posted by: Mar man | Jun 2 2021 20:44 utc | 20

Thank you b for a detailed analysis. That sure prodded the trolls into a dummy spit.

This 'event' bears all the hallmarks of UK stupidity and clumsy execution.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 2 2021 20:46 utc | 21

@Mao Cheng Ji | Jun 2 2021 20:24 utc | 15

12:25 is the second email? I thought it was the first email, the one everyone wanted to see.

Sorry, my mistake. After checking it looks like you are right. 12:25 should be the first mail indeed....

Posted by: Norwegian | Jun 2 2021 20:46 utc | 22

Mao Cheng Ji | Jun 2 2021 20:24 utc | 15

I hadn't checked your link before. That does purport to be the first email, which was sent to "[email protected]. Pretty vague way of sending a life-or-death threat. Anything I send to "[email protected]" gets replied to much much later, if at all. There is a curious element as only the flight number is in bold type, exactly similar to the "Dossier" version.

So Dossier must have had an exact copy of the first one when it sent the second. Conclusion; Dossier sent the first one as well?

Posted by: Stonebird | Jun 2 2021 20:52 utc | 23

Machine translation of Roma's words:

"... "A simple example: I had good relations with Franak Vechorko. I filmed Tikhanovskaya's visit to Athens. Everything was fine, we worked for 2 days. He praised me. He flew away, and in less than a week, the attitude towards me changed to the opposite. I talked with him - and he said: we need to consider the prospects for further cooperation. "

Seems like he suspects an inside job.

Posted by: Paco | Jun 2 2021 20:56 utc | 24

Machine trans, with clip:

"Now there is simply no activity. Now it cannot be. Even at that time, when I was in Vilnius, I spoke openly - now there is no need for street activity. At least we have to wait until the situation in the economy heats up so that people go out for a bowl of stew." ..

https://t.me/zheltyeslivy/17464

Posted by: Paco | Jun 2 2021 21:02 utc | 25

Posted by: Mar man | Jun 2 2021 20:44 utc | 20

If the email had originated from within Belarus, then that info would certainly have been leaked to the western press by now and would be presented as evidence the email was simply a pretext by Belarus to ground the plane.

Alternative; On June 1 Andrey Pivovarov, who had run Khorkovsky's operations in Russia. Could he have been the source ? ie did the first email come from St. Petersburg? Which would go a long way to explain why Minsk was being slow to publish the email.

Khorkovsky and Pivovarov couldn't have been that arrogant, could they? To send from Russia itself?

Posted by: Stonebird | Jun 2 2021 21:05 utc | 26

@Stonebird "Anything I send to "[email protected]" gets replied to much much later, if at all."

I agree. But then I think the whole thing was, most likely, a Belarusian KGB op, so it doesn't really matter. They just needed an excuse.

Posted by: Mao Cheng Ji | Jun 2 2021 21:07 utc | 27

Hat tip to B for his reportage. Where is everyone else in journalism?

Question I have is whether or not Protasevich and Sapega were witting to what game they were playing, or were they just being played by (foreign, most likely) higher-ups? If they weren't clued-in, then they should be plenty angry at being used the way they are. Belorussian authorities should be taking the opportunity this presents for turning them, and then generously pardoning them, and thus coming out smelling like roses from all this brouhaha. That would be a most droll outcome.

Posted by: Daniel N. White | Jun 2 2021 21:17 utc | 28

I haven't seen much focus on Vilnius, Athens and RyanAir in all this.

If the West (western governments, ICAO, airports, airlines, and news media) were at all interested in the truth, wouldn't they just have Vilnius airport, Athens airport, and RyanAir make public the information that they have on their side, including:

- All copies of the emails (including 09.25 UTC and at 09.56 UTC) with all the headers (including CC/BCC fields)
- Transcripts and recordings of all communications with the plane in the 50 minutes between 09.25 UTC and its landing at 10:15 utc.

That Vilnius airport, Athens airport, and RyanAir don't just release this information, and that Western governments and news media don't demand they do so, suggests 1) that the withheld information contradicts the West's narrative, and 2) that they're only interested in milking their demonization for as long as they can.

Surely upon receiving those emails, Vilnius and Athens also urgently tried to contact the plane in order to save the lives of the people onboard? If they didn't, does that mean they were negligent or does it mean that this all unfolded as planned so that Belarus could be demonized?

Posted by: Canadian Cents | Jun 2 2021 21:26 utc | 29

One aim of Viacorka and other anti-Russian agitators have is to impose sanctions against Belarus and Russia. A day after the flight incident the former oligarch and tax evader Mikhail Khodorkovski made a big push:

Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a former oil tycoon who fell foul of Vladimir Putin's Kremlin, said European countries should punish Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko for his act of air "piracy" by sanctioning oil and potash producers.
"Roman Protasevich must be freed and the dictator punished," Khodorkovsky said in a statement to Reuters. "The dictator should be hit where it hurts the most: his wallet."

"European countries should join U.S. sanctions against Belneftekhim and sanction Belaruskali," Khodorkovsky said. Belneftekhim is Belarus's state oil company. Belaruskali is one of the world's largest producers of potash.

European leaders threatened on Monday to limit international air traffic over Belarus and possibly restrict its ground transport, after a Ryanair passenger plane was forced to land in an incident denounced by Western countries as "state piracy".

Viacorka's false narrative has had for now the desired outcome. As Foreign Policy headlined yesterday:

Lukashenko’s Air Piracy Has Revitalized Belarus’s Opposition
An exhausted movement finds new support abroad.

But that will only hold if the narrative Viacorka provided will not fall apart.

On May 25, just 48 hours after the incident had happened, the Aviation Directorate of Belarus published a complete record of what had happened in Russian and English language. It also included the transcript of the radio traffic between the Air Traffic Controller (ATC) and the pilot.

<== B's words help support banksters and disgruntled Oligarch network <= a theory? collective interest meshed into a system <=capable to circumvent the political processes<= in most nation states. Neither nation state side can trust the other, so the private network of disgruntled Oligarchs has standing to baffle the politically lead nation state.

The elected or in place authoritative leaderships, within each of the nation states, are no longer relevant to happenings orchestrated by the private party Oligarchs. Such national leaders are no longer included in the regime change activities; banksters, big pharmas and other Oligarch owned agencies. .. These private oligarch controlled agencies seem to have used their money and influence to circumvent the elected or appointed leadership in most of the nation states of the world. The mobsters are busy destroying all-means national leaders might have available to use as tools to maintain their jobs and to fight back.. WEAK NATION STATES allow MSM TO COMPLETELY CONTROL THE NARRATIVES. This is how Lenin took over Russia. When the nation state is weak or led by an insider puppet, the privately produced narratives control public opinion without resistance or destructive interference related to the mind control design of the narrative message.

To me, the nation state system has become Chicago managed by Al Capoone.

--
https://strana.ua/news/336619-v-filme-o-posadke-ryanair-v-minske-priveli-pismo-terroristov.html

https://strana.ua/img/forall/u/11/33/photo_2021-06-02_21-07-08.jpg

Posted by: Mao Cheng Ji | Jun 2 2021 19:29 utc | 6
<== my browser cannot translate the first link.


@Norwegian,
12:25 is the second email? I thought it was the first email, the one everyone wanted to see.

As for the Thunderbird client, it's open-source, so I wouldn't be surprised if countries like Belarus and Russia preferred it to western proprietary software. Posted by: Mao Cheng Ji 15

<== The neat part of Thunderbird is that it allows encryption that avoids the web based surveillance..
I like thunderbird myself. Keep it up B, fantastic.. !

Posted by: snake | Jun 2 2021 21:36 utc | 30

"HOW KHODORKOVSKY’S “DOSSIER CENTER WORKS"
By Anna Kovaleva

The CIA has many "friends" they can dial up to help them.

"During the work on “dossiers”, our employee was able to photograph the documents, confirming his words. This is the official response of Google to a request from the CIA to provide information from the accounts of those involved in the “dossier” investigation."

I can't find any other articles by Anna Kovaleva on the Dossier Center.

https://www.stalkerzone.org/how-khodorkovskys-dossier-center-

Posted by: Tom | Jun 2 2021 21:50 utc | 31

MGM unloaded James Bond just in time.

the idea of the superiority of western intelligence is sheerest fantasy. the US can bomb something to rubble and in the running of an operation they can royally screw over and devastate the entire landscape. but achieve something? do they even know how email works? how do computers even know how to get a message to an address in the "BCC" field???? something with magnets right?

Posted by: rjb1.5 | Jun 2 2021 22:00 utc | 32

To trust the ICAO seems to me a bit naive. These are all former combat pilots, and while there may be outliers, they all toe the line.
If the OPCW can be coerced and prop-owned, so the more can the ICAO.

Posted by: bjd | Jun 2 2021 22:07 utc | 33

Paco @24 & 25--

Thanks for that info! Sure, it was an "inside job" since they all emanate from the Outlaw US Empire. He was played for the same reason Russiagate was ran and Novichok invented in an attempt to contain Russia. The fools must have thought the signing of the Russia/China Good Neighbor Treaty in 2001 was a hoax and that Russia would "naturally" have a racist reaction to China's geoeconomic ascension and join Trump's Crusade. Oops!

Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 2 2021 22:13 utc | 34

When was Roman Protasevich arrested?

‘I can understand perfectly how the report of my illness got about, I have even heard on good authority that I was dead. James Ross Clemens, a cousin of mine, was seriously ill two or three weeks ago in London, but is well now. The report of my illness grew out of his illness. The report of my death was an exaggeration.’

–– Mark Twain

Franak Viačorka's tweet at 12:35 GMT includes a photo of Roman Protasevich standing in an airport bus on its way from the plane to the transit terminal. We know the claim that "Belarus thugs" entered the airplane and dragged him out is untrue. Belorussian sources say Protasevich was only arrested when passengers boarded the plane. This would be half an hour to one hour before the plane took off at 17.48 UTC

By this time the Western media were already publishing fake news about the "hijacking" and Protasevich's arrest. Politicians were already condemning Belarus and Lukashenko. I do not think the Mighty Wurlitzer has ever played this fast.

Here are some stories by original timestamp (UTC):

Flightradar24 tweeted about the arrest at 13:31 UTC. President Gitanas Nauseda of Lithuania condemned the incident at 14:04 UTC

Posted by: Petri Krohn | Jun 2 2021 22:16 utc | 35

nietzsche1510 | Jun 2 2021 22:08 utc | 34

Why are Russia & China enabling and funding the British & Dollar Imperialism?

Russia has positive trade balance with Britain and its imports declined from $ 9 billion to $5 billion per year, and exports around $24 billion. In which currency is the UK paying Russia? Russia’s overall holding are approx 30+ billion pounds ($16 billion long term investments). So Russia is enabling Britain’s growth and imperialism. China exports around $75 billion to the UK? How about China’s imports from the UK? Who is funding and enabling British Imperialism?

Britain (U$A too) have run a deficit on its international trade for nearly 40+ years in succession around $200+ billion per year. How do they pay without impacting their currencies? Which nations are giving Britain funds to enable MONETARY Imperialism? Which nations are funding and enabling the Dollar Empire?

When will the Russian and Chinese media expose the monetary imperialism? This monetary imperialism drives the chaos, ENSLAVEMENT and pursuit of hegemony in our world.

Posted by: Max | Jun 2 2021 22:35 utc | 36

Don’t expect much from the ICAO investigation.
All transcripts will be thoroughly cleaned.The only unbiased recording would be the CVR. But I am sure [as I wrote in a previous post] that we will soon learn that it was unfortunately erased automatically on the return flight from Minsk to Vilnius.

http://www.b737.org.uk/communications.htm

And by the way, still no word from the pilot? He/she should have saved the tape. [if only to cover his responsibility for continuing to fly 20 minutes to Vilnius ...]
Posted by: Rêver | May 31 2021 21:27 utc | 28

But was he/she the one who flew the plane from Minsk to Vilnius? He had probably exceeded his time on duty. Another pilot? From where? Just compare it with the bomb alert on another Ryanair a few days later...

Posted by: Rêver | Jun 2 2021 22:37 utc | 37

Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 2 2021 22:13 utc | 35

Look at their tactics, drive a whole country to hunger, the proper translation should be "when people go out for a bowl of chow", which in Belarus brings back memories of occupation and destruction under the flag that now the opposition is identifying with. Really offensive for the Soviet Republic that suffered the biggest nazi blow.

The timeline is described in detail, tricks and lies unveiled, as I said before the narrative is in their hands since they have the records and the main character.

Posted by: Paco | Jun 2 2021 22:40 utc | 38

"It seems a second plane has hit the other tower... oh wait... [a few minutes later...] NOW it seems a second plane has hit the other tower."

Hacks, shills, false flags and general incompetence. Oh and the listless indifference of the masses. History is rarely spectacular and even more rarely exciting.

Hats off to b for dogged determination and a masterclass in journalism.

Posted by: Patroklos | Jun 2 2021 22:42 utc | 39

Don’t expect much from the ICAO investigation.
All transcripts will be thoroughly cleaned.The only unbiased recording would be the CVR. But I am sure [as I wrote in a previous post] that we will soon learn that it was unfortunately erased automatically on the return flight from Minsk to Vilnius.

http://www.b737.org.uk/communications.htm

And by the way, still no word from the pilot? He/she should have saved the tape. [if only to cover his responsibility for continuing to fly 20 minutes to Vilnius ...]
Posted by: Rêver | May 31 2021 21:27 utc | 28

But was he/she the one who flew the plane from Minsk to Vilnius? He had probably exceeded his time on duty. Another pilot? From where? Just compare it with the bomb alert on another Ryanair a few days later...

Posted by: Rêver | Jun 2 2021 22:45 utc | 40

Paco @38--

Petri Krohn @36 nails the coffin shut with his addition to the detective work. The entire BigLie now stands naked in the wind. I do hope Russia's FSB reads this blog and puts all this info to use if it hasn't figured it out already. Those with social media accounts should tweet this out to Resistance journalists like Finnian Cunningham, John Pilger, and Caitlin Johnstone, for this time the West's hubris has buried their narrative.

Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 2 2021 22:58 utc | 41

Well done b! Excellent work. I am not easily impressed. Kudos.

Posted by: David G Horsman | Jun 2 2021 23:05 utc | 42


Chinese and Western narrative powers are now experiencing "a period of transition.
Zhang Weiwei


Chinese President Xi Jinping said China needs "to develop a voice in international discourse that matches China's comprehensive national strength and international status," as Chinese top leaders had a group study session on strengthening China's capacity for international communication on Monday, with experts saying China will not keep silent amid a stigmatization and propaganda warfare launched by the US and its allies, and China has the confidence to shape a more "reliable, admirable and respectable image."
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202106/1225146.shtml


When the US and its allies have realized that they cannot bully China into submission through a trade war and military pressure, and failed in the competition with China in the performance of handling the COVID-19 pandemic, they have selected the battleground of public opinion, where they still have clear advantages due to the long-existing media hegemony owned by the West, said Chinese experts.
To stay weak and obey, and accept Western narrative hegemony in the international field of public opinion is the key for a non-Western country to keep the ties with the US friendly. It's never about democracy and freedom; it's about strength and autonomy.
it's not necessary to merely focus on Western mainstream media's opinion, but to pay more attention to the public opinion in the third world,

Posted by: Rêver | Jun 2 2021 23:08 utc | 43


Chinese and Western narrative powers are now experiencing "a period of transition.
Zhang Weiwei


Chinese President Xi Jinping said China needs "to develop a voice in international discourse that matches China's comprehensive national strength and international status," as Chinese top leaders had a group study session on strengthening China's capacity for international communication on Monday, with experts saying China will not keep silent amid a stigmatization and propaganda warfare launched by the US and its allies, and China has the confidence to shape a more "reliable, admirable and respectable image."
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202106/1225146.shtml


When the US and its allies have realized that they cannot bully China into submission through a trade war and military pressure, and failed in the competition with China in the performance of handling the COVID-19 pandemic, they have selected the battleground of public opinion, where they still have clear advantages due to the long-existing media hegemony owned by the West, said Chinese experts.
To stay weak and obey, and accept Western narrative hegemony in the international field of public opinion is the key for a non-Western country to keep the ties with the US friendly. It's never about democracy and freedom; it's about strength and autonomy.
it's not necessary to merely focus on Western mainstream media's opinion, but to pay more attention to the public opinion in the third world,

Posted by: Rêver | Jun 2 2021 23:10 utc | 44

At times I disagree vehemently with b, but this is a shining example of what I expect from MOA, top level journalism.
To me it is pretty clear this is hybrid warfare, an asymmetric response is to be expected. Posted by: Norwegian | Jun 2 2021 19:39 utc | 7
I agree with both points. I am fine with where we disagree.
Thank. To Karloff too.

In fact, the one thing I don't need is an echo chamber and it's why I like this site and a few others.

Posted by: David G Horsman | Jun 2 2021 23:20 utc | 45

I recall around the time of the snowden disclosures a tv interview with the founder of proton mail.He claimed the USG were demanding the encryption keys, under some security statuette.I believe was gagged after this interview .I remember the founder stating passionately, he would close down the service rather than give up all his customers emails. Something changed, as it is still operating.

Posted by: RC213V | Jun 3 2021 1:06 utc | 46

My mistake it was lavabit not protonmail.

Posted by: RC213V | Jun 3 2021 1:15 utc | 47

@ RC213V | Jun 3 2021 1:06 utc | 45.. yeah - it changed.. it is like telegram and not an encryption set up in the way people might like to believe it as.. watch this video and substitute protonmail for telegram - same deal..https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBTsUVrCDAQ

Posted by: james | Jun 3 2021 1:32 utc | 48

Excellent piece of diligent sleuthing, b.
There were too many blanks and blind spots in the Media narrative.
Thanks for casting your net wide to illuminate them.
.....
Re: ICAO
I hope your faith in the ICAO investigation is not misplaced. It is, after all, an allegedly neutral international NGO. But so many so-called NGOs often turn out to be infested with implants with pro-Western biases.
It's might be possible to check the validity of ICAO by finding out whether it was involved in the MH 17 'investigation'.

If it was not, then it would suggest that the Dutch Kangaroo Court which blamed Russia for the shoot-down didn't want any genuine experts derailing their pre-determined conclusions.

On the other hand, Wikipedia's MH17 entry says...

In December 2014, in a letter to the Security Council, the Netherlands UN representative wrote that "The Dutch government is deliberately refraining from any speculation or accusations regarding legal responsibility for the downing of MH17."[237] Also in December, the assistant secretary of the United States Department of State's European and Eurasian Affairs said America had given all of its information, including classified information to the Dutch investigators and to the ICAO.

Does that sound like USA stovepiping Top Secret Stuff to a 'neutral' NGO? Why does something that's going to be discussed at an inquiry need to be Top Secret?

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Jun 3 2021 1:38 utc | 49

The Belarus authorities should say they will release Protasevich if Assange is released.

Posted by: lysias | Jun 3 2021 1:40 utc | 50

@ lysias | Jun 3 2021 1:40 utc | 49 who wrote

"
The Belarus authorities should say they will release Protasevich if Assange is released.
"

Another commenter on an earlier thread suggested the same and I agree. What a statement that would make to the world. Especially if it is prefaced with a documentary like b has provided here, only more complete, that disputes the empire narrative. If provided as part of the lead up to the deal it would be harder to keep out of the Western public's eyes.

Posted by: psychohistorian | Jun 3 2021 2:03 utc | 51

Thanks B for taking control of the details of the narrative including the details of the times the two Hamas-bomb-threat hoax emails were sent to Vilnius, Minsk and Athens.

The continuing obfuscation by ProtonMail over the first email serves to obscure who actually sent the emails and whether that entity sent both emails, sent only one of the two emails or had other parties send the emails.

It would seem that whoever sent the emails had another agenda in mind, namely to test Belarusian air defence readiness and whether Belarus would actually try to bring down the Ryanair jet by force, even to the extent of shooting it down. That unknown rogue party is likely to have believed that Belarus would shoot down the passenger jet; its agenda may have even relied on Belarus doing precisely that, in order for another narrative favouring Juanita Guaido-Tikhonovskaya to start working its charm on Western governments and MSM.

Posted by: Jen | Jun 3 2021 2:18 utc | 52

Does anybody know for which reason the girlfriend had an outstanding arrest warrent?

Posted by: m | Jun 3 2021 5:06 utc | 53

As much as mostly everybody here would like to see Assange liberated from torture, equating him with this Roma guy is a very serious mistake. Let us not forget that Roma in spite of his boyish face participated in what can be described as a death squad, the Azov battalion, and he is wanted in Lugansk for crimes against humanity. No matter how much he collaborates with the investigation the most he is going to get is some leniency with the length of his sentence, but he is going to be behind bars for a long time, or worse, he could be given to the Lugansk authorities and face capital punishment.

A quick look at the papers of reference this morning and be sure, this Roma guy is going to follow the same path that the Ukrainian Jean D'Arc, do you guys remember her*? He is going to be thrown down the memory hole.

*Nadya Savchenko, we are Nadya, free Nadya etc. etc.

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 5:34 utc | 54

M @ 57:

The girlfriend Sofia Sapega had an arrest warrant for revealing the names and personal details of Belarusian police officers and their families on a Telegram channel (Black Book of Belarus) where she was editor. In most countries, doxxing people is illegal.

Posted by: Jen | Jun 3 2021 5:35 utc | 55

"Does anybody know for which reason the girlfriend had an outstanding arrest warrent?"

She ran a website which published names and addresses of Belarussian policemen and their families and suggested to "contact them".

Posted by: b | Jun 3 2021 5:40 utc | 56

Posted by: b | Jun 3 2021 5:40 utc | 56

They found in her telephone forty or so new "files" ready to be posted in the Black Book.

Excellent work, congrats.

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 6:23 utc | 57

Posted by: David G Horsman | Jun 2 2021 23:20 utc | 45

+1

And if you have any good sites to recommend - on this (hard to believe anyone would be as thorough as b) or any other topics - I'm always desperately seeking independent voices.

Posted by: _K_C_ | Jun 3 2021 6:39 utc | 58

I suppose we have to congratulate the West for making Belarus even closer to Russia.

Posted by: Smith | Jun 3 2021 6:47 utc | 59

Belarus has now published screenshots of the Email with the 12:25 timestamp.
Protonmail previously refused comments because this "email is not in the public domain".
Now it is, and Protonmail should be pressed to comment.

Posted by: Horst | Jun 3 2021 7:04 utc | 60

Paco #54

Thank you for your statement regarding Julian Assange. There is no equivalence here.

Assange is a journalist reporting crimes against humanity ~ persecution is what he is enduring in a kangaroo court.

Protasevich is a war criminal who self promotes his membership of nazi assault teams and is in the pay of the UKUSA belligerents. He is likely to be tried in a court for his crimes. It won't a be court such as the discredited englander courts.


Now there is this interesting character that needs to incarcerated at the earliest opportunity. This nefarious agent provocateur is a mate of barfingcat as referenced by b in his opening report:

Frank Viacorka is a non-resident fellow of the NATO lobby Atlantic Council. His Wilson Center biography says:

Franak Viačorka is a Belarusian journalist and media expert. Franak works as a digital media strategist at the U.S. Agency for Global Media (contractor). He has worked as a creative director for the Belarus service of Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty and Vice President for Digital Communication Network. Franak is a frequent speaker and an advocate for democracy and personal freedom. He graduated from American University in Washington D.C. (M.A.) and Warsaw University in Poland (B.A.).

Viacorka has long worked on regime changing Belarus. He was at the core of the U.S. financed organization Nexta who directed the protests in Belarus after its 2020 election.


Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 3 2021 7:18 utc | 61

Some music for the imprisoned wherever that may be.

Dead can Dance
The Host of Seraphim

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 3 2021 7:27 utc | 62

Looks more and more like a pawn sacrifice. Nazi-Roman was not as important as to keep him strategically in the long run and his handlers decided to make a martyr out of him. Too many pictures of him directly affiliated with Nazi scum. Rather have him tactically used in the arena of perception management to the Western audience than to have him as a potential candidate in a cabinet with Guaido-Tsikhanouskaya.

Posted by: v | Jun 3 2021 8:19 utc | 63

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 3 2021 7:18 utc | 61

That's the one, with a polish name, Franak is like the Pope Francisco, or Paco in spanish ;), that name does not exist in Orthodox christianity. Geography again, the western part of Belarus has a strong polish and lithuanian influence, the great Eurasian plains do not offer strong geographical borders like lets say the Pyrenees between Spain and France. The whole show is being run by the Poles, the Trojan horse that the brits left behind before jumping ship, and with imperial ambitions, “from sea to sea”, from the Baltic to the Black.

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 8:33 utc | 64

@snake 30,
https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=https://strana.ua/news/336619-v-filme-o-posadke-ryanair-v-minske-priveli-pismo-terroristov.html">https://strana.ua/news/336619-v-filme-o-posadke-ryanair-v-minske-priveli-pismo-terroristov.html">https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=https://strana.ua/news/336619-v-filme-o-posadke-ryanair-v-minske-priveli-pismo-terroristov.html

Posted by: Mao Cheng Ji | Jun 3 2021 8:36 utc | 65

Paco #64

Yes, the Poles, the land of camps and forgetfulness. Recently I had to explain to a colleague that Auschwitz-Birkenau etc., was in Poland, not Germany. He was totally unaware of that distinction. There was a lively discussion and I explained the frenzied controversy arising from the use of the term "Polish Death Camps" let alone "Polish Concentration Camps".

see wikipedia for a mealy mouthed explanation if you need.

I hear that when Russia finally conquered the German and Polish armies they were thorough in their response to the Polish Nazis.


On that bleak note: some balm from Lisa Gerrard sings Sanvean to ease the troubled souls.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 3 2021 9:24 utc | 66

Roma is bound to become a sensation in Belarus, and beyond, tonight the same channel is broadcasting an interview with some host by the name of Markov, the program is called "Nothing Personal". Not a fan of popcorn but I'll stock some goodies, this serial is going to beat Neflix to dust.

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 9:39 utc | 67

Is it just me or does it look like the Nazi death squad kid's arrest was announced in the West before he was actually arrested, or even identified as a fugitive by the Belorussian authorities? Could this be why the Mockingbird mass media is making such a big deal about the red herring of the second email? They need to keep everyone's attention away from the time of his arrest until everyone forgets about when they first heard of that arrest?

Posted by: William Gruff | Jun 3 2021 9:40 utc | 68

Thank you, b, for the excellent journalism, and thank you all commentors for the invaluable additional contribution of information!

May I extend the thoughts of Jen (52) - however with another twist:
>It would seem that whoever sent the emails had another agenda in mind....

As has been stated before in another thread on this topic: Sending the mail to "[email protected]" is probably the last ("kind of" still official) address to send an emergency mail to, since "info@xyz" will usually not be read and acted upon immediately.
Thus it seems this mail was INTENDED not to be read and reacted upon *in time* - but sent nevertheless.
Now: What would have happend, if Minsk had NOT reacted within those 20min where the plane was within Belarussian airspace?
Vilnius surely was alerted. Yes, Vilnius ATC "of course" would have "immendiately" informed Minsk as soon as they got knowledge of the mail, but "unfortunately" the plane was already under Vilnius control when the information reached the tower... --- so Vilnius ATC would have "immediately" informed the plane about the bomb thread when entering Lithuanian airspace, re-routed the plane out of its airspace, particularly Vilnius neighborhood, and probably made them land in Warsaw. There, of course, a "bomb" would have been "found" - with Protasevich and Sapega directly "on scene" and reporting "life" about the barely escaped aircraft-desaster.
This could have been spin-doctored wonderfully: The dictator Lukashenko *knowingly* (the first mail WAS sent!) did not alarm the aircraft, because he wanted to get Protasevich killed and did not mind to have all other passengers as collateral damage. Putin must have been informed, since such a move cannot be made without Putin knowing. And see: Hamas is indeed a terror-organisation, as we said all along! Letting an aircraft being blown up just to kill an obnoxious journalist is so outrageous that the Free World (TM) just MUST act and regime-change Belarus and Russia NOW.
This would be a pretty sinister plot and I would *love* to be wrong!
Any thoughts?


Posted by: JWW | Jun 3 2021 10:05 utc | 69

es, yes, a great piece of journalism and many insightful comments too. Go b, and the flies!

This sequence of events highlights the operation of the western narrative creation machine. Franak Viačorka (FV) at 11:35 utc insinuates that the purpose of the plane redirection was the arrest of the Azov Battalion regime change operator. If we assume the Belarussian narrative that Roman Protasevich (RP) was arrested during passing through re-boarding checks, and that the bomb threat assessment was complete by 13:20 utc, then FV's prediction is at least 1 hour 45 minutes before the earliest possible arrest.

I think that b's identification of FV and his tweet is the best part of this article, as it shows the beginning of the public face of the narrative creation machine in action. I assume that FV knew of RP's arrest warrant and that re-boarding passengers must pass through re-boarding checks and thus the warrant would be acted upon. Thus, it is a confident prediction. It is the 11 000 re/quoted-tweets that are interesting. That is the machine in action. Then the news wires pick up on it and the media gets going.

Thank you Petri Krohn (@35) for the UTC times of the articles! Here begins the flood. Lets assume that it takes an hour to compose and have approved for publication an article at these outlets. Thus, the first 4 are relying on the assertion as no arrest could have occurred. It is the "opinion machine" backed up with the only facts available (the flight redirection, and potentially the bomb threat). The rest is just rubbish. All of this completely justifies Putin's declaration that its all an emotional over reaction.

The next best part of b's report are the identifications of the acts to "fix" the narrative that is being weakened by evidence. The standard use of omission and careful language. I think this is one of the most insidious and effective measures. Its all about the "news cycle" of the news and the "attention span" of their audience. All you have to do is prop up the narrative for a few days and then the event will fall off the radar.

But not for little b. As for the ICAO investigation, if fear it will be Douma'ified (new verb!). But, perhaps not. I recall Alexander Mercouris stating that the head of the ICAO secretariat is Chinese, and the secretariat coordinates and publishes the report. Thus, I am hopeful that in a few weeks b will be fully vindicated.

So, remember this one. Its a classic case of narrative creation with sycophantic journalists publishing opinion pieces masquerading as news to support geopolitical influence as dupes get duped and completely unrelated people are, in this case, inconvenienced; in others, they die.

Hats off to b for spotting this as an event worth watching and researching. Thank you.

Posted by: George Sands | Jun 3 2021 11:45 utc | 70

RT reports of the TV docu of the case

Protasevich says he was set up:

Ryanair plane may have landed in Minsk due to fake bomb threat by angry opposition colleague, says Belarusian activist Protasevich

The jailed Belarusian activist Roman Protasevich, who was arrested last month after his flight was forced to make an emergency landing in Minsk, may have been set up by a colleague with whom he had an intense personal conflict.

That’s according to Protasevich himself, who spoke on the Belarusian state-run television channel ONT.
...
“I had a personal conflict with one person, quite tense. Especially in recent days,” Protasevich explained. “I wrote in the work chat 40 minutes before the flight where and how I would fly. That person was [in the chat], too. And then this situation happens.”

According to Protasevich, as soon as he was taken to a detention center, he began to think that he had been set up by a colleague, whom he did not name.

“We have two such strong leadership characters. And we are obviously going to have some problems sooner or later,” he explained.

The Belarusian activist also noted that his colleague has a connection with “cyber guerillas” who have a history of using fake bomb threats to ground planes.

However, he clarified that he couldn’t be sure the current situation was “a continuation of the conflict.”

"We have two such strong leadership characters. And we are obviously going to have some problems sooner or later,” he explained."

Who is the colleague of Protasevich who has a strong character?

Well, I introduced the guy at the beginning of the above post ...

It is most likely Frank Viacorka.

Posted by: b | Jun 3 2021 12:56 utc | 71

The addressees in the 12:25 mail show Minsk in TO and shows no CC. I don't know yet whether that fits with the discussion with Protonmail. The argument that Protonmail weaseled out because Minsk was in CC does not look valid.

Posted by: Tuyzentfloot | Jun 3 2021 13:13 utc | 72

MoA will likely be sued into bankruptcy by Protonmail for this totally baseless claim. If Protonmail were a CIA front, they most likely wouldn't act like this. Crypto AG always maintained its 'neutrality'. The Protonmail founder, an American-Taiwanese guy, is simply a bit naive and thinks he is fighting for freedom and democracy.

Posted by: Tinman | Jun 2 2021 19:41 utc | 8

I wonder if Tinman can be sued into bankruptcy by MoonOfAlabama Inc for a dubious claim. That would require a crowdfunding by MOA, so perhaps Tinman is safe.

OTOH, what separates the group of people "CIA fronts" for "those who think that they fight for freedom and democracy"? There is a big overlap.

Posted by: Piotr Berman | Jun 3 2021 13:15 utc | 73

Case closed
@72 same story but not a youtube link


It is also possible that his “comrades-in-arms” in the opposition camp simply handed him over to the Belarusian authorities as a result of an internal conflict, as it appears with an aide of schoolteacher-turned-president Svetlana Tikhanovskaya.

Posted by: gary | Jun 3 2021 13:46 utc | 74

With b's timeline, coupled with that mentioned by Petri Krohn above, that makes it almost certain that this was a setup by the West to embarrass Lukeshenko with the sacrificed pawn. Not impossible that it was merely a personal conflict with Viacorka, but seems less likely he alone would have been able to disseminate the information and have so many western sources spew it so quickly, unless it was an organized operation.

Indeed, it seems like whoever was running the op began to fear that the initial email was too subtle, and might not reach Minsk ATC before the plane left Belarussian airspace, which explains the second, direct email. I'm assuming the KGB/FSB will realize that since Roma was sacrificed, besides the intended embarrassment to Lukeshenko and re-invigoration of sanctions and protests against him, it is almost certain that whatever "plans" or other information Roma was given at his meetings with US officials in Greece would also be some sort of disinformation, and should be treated with skepticism. However, as is so often the case, "human" breakdowns often occur, and there may have been recovery of deleted data, old personal exchange emails, etc. which Roma had been instructed to never keep but, well, it's so damn handy just to keep a copy.... Plus, if Roma is pissy about being sacrificed, he might reveal more than was intended, too.

At any rate, there may be some very useful tangential intel gathered from Roma, his girl and their electronics, perhaps more than was intended by the West. Might even explain the sudden detention of the NGO official trying to flee to Poland a day or two later.

Posted by: J Swift | Jun 3 2021 14:00 utc | 75

I pointed out some similarities between the Protasevich and Navalny cases in a comment on May 27 2021 19:41 utc - emergency landing, fake bomb scare, detention of western-backed activist. I speculated that some of the same people could be behind both incidents.

And now it also turns out that in each case, the targeted activist reportedly had a huge row with another leader of his organisation not long before the incident. Navalny is said to have had a row with Vladimir Ashurkov of the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) which they both co-founded. That was over Navalny's shutting down of that organisation and taking money out of it for himself.

There are also - not surprisingly - close connections with Khodorkovsky in both cases.

The big difference is that Navalny went along with the "Novichok" narrative that put the blame on the Kremlin. He even returned to Russia to become a martyr figure there. His handlers in Germany must have been convinced that he would not go rogue once he returned, or else they would not have let him go.

In contrast, it was unfortunate for Protasevich's western backers that they had no access and no control over him after his detention. That has now endangered their narrative - which seemed to be going fine since the incident occurred - that the plane carrying Protasevich was effectively hijacked by Lukashenko in order to arrest him.

Posted by: Brendan | Jun 3 2021 14:15 utc | 76

I wondered whether it was possible that Viacorka was so fast on the ball simply because he had had a phone call with Protasevich, but note how relaxed Protasevich is. How then would Viacorka pull out all the stops for this incident when Protasevich is not worried yet.

Posted by: Tuyzenthfloot | Jun 3 2021 14:15 utc | 77

I hope Lukashenka gets the message that his days as "Europe's last dictator" are numbered. His choice is whether he wants 'the EUkraine treatment' for Belarus.

George Soros has 'plans' for ex-soviet satrapies that aren't designed to benefit anybody but the Bilderbergers. And he's running out of time, too.

Posted by: Kevin Quinn | Jun 3 2021 15:00 utc | 78

OT
Thanks to Uncle T. for links to the very best band of the world (imo).

Posted by: Mina | Jun 3 2021 15:39 utc | 79

@ George Sands | Jun 3 2021 11:45 utc | 70... nice commentary-summation... supports @ 68 william gruff viewpoint and mine as well... the wikipedia page on Frank Viacorka is interesting.. these are young people - franak is 33 and roman p just turned 26... it would not be unusual for there to be some rivalry between the 2... this plan would have had to be in the tube for a while longer though for them to hatch this...it wasn't just an argument the day of, or a day or two before.. that is my thought.. the conference in athens and who was attending would be known some time before the event itself.. the other thought is roman p was in on the plan... hard to know..

Posted by: james | Jun 3 2021 15:45 utc | 80

@ Posted by: Tuyzentfloot | Jun 3 2021 13:13 utc | 72

Protonmail doesn't deny the first e-mail exist. It merely states that, since it didn't leak (only the second one did), they won't confirm or deny its existence.

Posted by: vk | Jun 3 2021 15:57 utc | 81

The smoking gun?

Earlier is was assumed that the photo tweeted by Franak Viačorka at 12:35 UTC had been taken and sent to him by Sophia Sapega.

It was also assumed that the event described by Roman Protasevich had happened at the Athens airport.

Protasevic case: In the hands of the EYP the material from the security cameras of the airport – The Indicator, May 26, 2021

The material from the security cameras at the airport is in the hands of the EYP, with the investigation for the presence of the journalist-activist already started and the possibility of suspicious persons being examined, as complained by Roman Protasevic himself.

The mobilization of the Greek authorities began after the complaints of the journalist himself that while he was at the airport he located a man, whose characteristics he even described in a message he sent to a friend.

According to him, this man was watching him and photographing him .

According to information, the Greek authorities claim that the investigation so far has not given a suspicious role to people who were at the airport while they have not identified a person with the characteristics given by the journalist.

I commented on the story earlier:

I think we can assume that the "Russian-looking" agent that took a photo of Roman Protasevich at the Athens airport was working for the same service that sent the email. They would need to confirm that Protasevich was on the plane before sending the email.

If the photo incident happened at the Athens airport, as I assume, then Greek law enforcement should have surveillance video of this person. Is Greece searching for him? If he really was Belorussian (or Russian), then they should. If not, then most likely he was working for Team West.

It now seems that the incident happened at the Minsk airport. It was not Sophia Sapega, who took the photo, but the unknown "Russian-looking" and "Russian-speaking" person.

Protasevich describes the incident on the ONT video at 30 minutes. The photo was taken at about 12:28 UTC, only 7 minutes before it was tweeted Franak Viačorka at 12:35 UTC.

Timeline (UTC)

  • 12:02: Protasevich enters airport bus

  • 12:22: Airport buses leave tarmac for terminal

  • ~12:28: Unknown person takes photo of Protasevich. Note, that a passenger boarding bridge is seen in the background. It is a mirror image of what is seen on the ONT video at 21 minutes.

  • 12:29: Airport buses have arrived at terminal. Doors are opened and passengers enter terminal building.

  • 12:35: Franak Viačorka tweets photo and accuses Belarus of piracy.

Belarus must know the identity of this person, evidently a passenger on FR4978. They have him on surveillance video and recorded his passport. They should have arrested him on charges of international terrorism, instead of Protasevic.

...maybe they did.

Posted by: Petri Krohn | Jun 3 2021 16:08 utc | 82

@ Down South | Jun 2 2021 18:56 utc |

"If this was a false flag operation designed to bring support and attention to the Belarusian regime changers, then it has been an absolute disaster because all it has done is deliver Belarus to Russia on a silver platter."

This is the crux of the matter, as it is certainly not the EU or NATO that will benefit. Maybe Belarus agencies wanting to prevent Lukashenko from sliding closer to EUNATO?

Posted by: Peter Moritz | Jun 3 2021 16:14 utc | 83

In fifteen minutes the saga continues, this time with an interview, same channel:

https://ont.by/

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 16:47 utc | 84

They have a uTube channel as well:

https://www.youtube.com/user/onttvchannel

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 16:59 utc | 85

In contrast to b's careful, fact-based analysis and conclusions, I will comment on a wild speculation without proof.

The strange part for me in all this, what b reports above, is that, aside from the official statement that no bomb was found, the events seem to me to report that a bomb was found. Or that there was some kind of genuine danger with that plane.

1) 'Why the departure of the cleared plane was delayed so long has not been explained.'

2) 'According to the Belarusian top diplomat, the country’s authorities did not know that Roman Protasevich, one of the co-founders of the Nexta Telegram channel, which was recognized as extremist in Belarus, and his Russian girlfriend Sofia Sapega were among the passengers. "These two persons were detained after they had passed through customs and border control to board the plane after it had been checked. So, there are no links between these events. I think that we see deliberate attempts to link these things to the plane’s landing after a bomb threat," he stressed.' -- If Belarus really wanted to arrest these two, and knew they were on board, I don't see why they would need a bomb threat to do so? They had warrents for their arrest, right?

3) The ProtonMail wackiness -- while I find b's arguments compelling, I still don't see why ProtonMail would implicate themselves so effectively unless the Swiss authorities had genuinely given them reason to do so. They have profits to protect, don't they?

4) Those emails sound like they may have been written by an intelligence service. I believe that perspective is suggested from a cui buno? point of view? But... it's so crazy-sounding, I mean Viacorka and the Dossier Center articulate much clearer than that.

5) What's with all the blocked flights? Initiated by Russia? They aren't part of any Western propaganda, which means they would only do that if there was a safety concern, wouldn't they?

AND I see, in b's latest report, that Russia is reducing it's holdings in the NWF of the US dollar to nothing, but is keeping 5 percent of it's NWF in pounds. This from the country of the Skripals, whose narrative is definitely as wacky-sounding as those emails (which could be interpreted as English humour)!! Maybe the British have done something to preserve that five percent share.

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Jun 3 2021 16:59 utc | 86

Machine translation:

"I am sure that many will condemn, support actions will come to naught, many will call me a traitor. But I absolutely don't care what they say. I am here and now and am ready to do everything in order to correct my mistakes. I followed my idea and my beliefs. The more I tried not to stick my nose in my own business, not to think about where and what money was coming from, what special services were influencing, the worse everything became."

https://t.me/sashakots/23353

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 17:13 utc | 87

Names started to be named.

Machine translation

"Roman Protasevich - about LOVE HATA: it was the main coordinating chat of street protests, "the entire information war" Participants: Stepan Putilo, Rudik, Tadeusz Dichan, Franak Vecherko, Motolko, Artyom Shraibman, Palchis, Dyushkevich, Bogdanovich, Anastasia Rogatko, Victoria Palchis, Evgeny Malakhovsky and others."

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 17:20 utc | 88

@Petri Krohn , that is very convincing.

The tweeted photo is not from Protasevich under arrest. As long as someone is not arrested you'd typically shut up not to alert people. The other way round works as well.

Posted by: Tuyzentfloot | Jun 3 2021 17:20 utc | 89

"- I was one of those people who urged people to go out on the street on August 9th. When all the charges were brought against me, I immediately pleaded guilty under Article 432 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus Organization of massive illegal actions. I fully admitted. Further, I realized that the appeals that I published were the reason for what began, in fact, uncontrollable riots. And for three days Minsk lived in chaos. "

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 17:22 utc | 90

Amazing the torrent of money, no wonder Victoria Cookie Nuland talked about five billion "invested" in Ukraine, some Olga Karach lives for ten years in Lithuania in a 600 sq. meters house in an exclusive neighborhood and some Latushko in a 3k Euro a month apartment.

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 17:32 utc | 91

"- Part of it is at the expense of Lithuanian taxpayers-they support a foreign politician. Partly – private sponsors, businessmen, representatives of the elite. The question here is what their interests are. I am interested in the answer to this question myself. Financial support from diasporas. There are many sources of funding."

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 17:36 utc | 92

"..Protasevich: The Polish government allocated 50 million zlotys directly to the Belarusian House in Warsaw"

The prime minister came to visit!!!

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 17:38 utc | 93

"Roman Protasevich: There will be no more street protests. It's stupid to call people when no one comes out.

Protasevich: In recent months, I have said that there are no streets and there will be no streets, no one will come out, it is pointless. But Vechorko said: there will be no streets - there will be no sanctions.

Protasevich: the sanctions are necessary for the economy to collapse as soon as possible and people to take to the streets - there will be hunger riots."

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 17:45 utc | 94

Petri Krohn | Jun 3 2021 16:08 utc | 82

There were earlier reports of five people staying at Minsk when the plane left. Three unknowns. But Roma was not interested in the person taking the photo - ie, he was not either "hiding" or "suspicious" of him/her as he is looking over the persons head. Not so likely to be the person "following" him as he claimed.

Posted by: Stonebird | Jun 3 2021 17:45 utc | 95

Everybody was invited to the party:

"Initially, Nekhta lived on advertising. Advertising posts cost good money. Then we launched reader donations. The first point of conflict was the Russian financing of the Nekhta project. Russian money was indeed present. When donats were opened, small deposits of up to $ 20 were received there. Later, Stepan boasted that a Russian company makes large transfers. +3000 euros, plus 5000 euros. Consistently once a week. I don't remember the name, something to do with mining. Ural... something there. But the most interesting thing is that I decided to search the Internet for information about this company, and I remember that the owner of the company is a well-known Russian oligarch. This person is a direct competitor of Mikhail Gutseriev. They work in the same field. Later, Nekhta published information about a constituent assembly, the movement of Gutseriev's personal plane, and some internal documents of his company. And Putilo insisted on this publication. Later, he met with this Russian oligarch in Warsaw."

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 18:07 utc | 96

"Stepan even got the Sakharov Prize for what I did. He didn't even say thank you. You ungrateful pig."

Poor Andrey Dmitrevich Sakharov, he was all for convergence and this is the way his name is used

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 18:17 utc | 97

"I hope the president will have enough political will, enough determination not to turn me over to the LPR"

Roman knows very well that he would face if given to Lugansk.

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 18:35 utc | 98

@ : Petri Krohn | Jun 3 2021 16:08 utc | 82... thanks...

Posted by: james | Jun 3 2021 18:38 utc | 99

Here the full interview:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ov1K-f930UA

Posted by: Paco | Jun 3 2021 18:40 utc | 100

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