7 ms·

This affects me directly since i am working outside of Belarus now and rely on air travel to visit my family, still this feels like the only reasonable answer t

This affects me directly since i am working outside of Belarus now and rely on air travel to visit my family, still this feels like the only reasonable answer to KGB messing with airlines. I am expecting that most planes to Belarus, from EU are going to be cancelled and people will have to reroute their travel through Moscow. In general it is terrifying how far my country went down the path of turning into another Turkmenistan\North Korea over the last 1 year+. Belarus was never a great example, of having fair courts ot great cops, but now it is just horrible. Half of my friends spent some time in jail, over the last year. Some were protesting actively, some wore clothing of "political colours" and were spotted by cops, some were arrested just because they were walking on the street and cops were in the mood to stir things up. Courts turned into a show where no matter how you were arrested or what was the basis for your arrest, you will get a fine and a few weeks (best case scenario - 15 days) in prison. Sadly, i feel that things are not going to get better anytime soon. tldr: Donbass and Belarus. Fly around if you wanna live.

arodyginc 5y ago
tldr: don't mess with Lucashenko and then you can fly over there just fine
- proxysna 5y ago
  Yeah sure, state funded terrorism does not affect you until it does
- golergka 5y ago
  I think that majority of HN readers, being from US and Europe, don't realise how many people from the shithole countries actually think like that and don't see anything wrong with this statement. And yes, I'm using the Trump's derogatory words here. I was born and still live in such a shithole country, and I'm incredibly angry and at it and this shithole mentality that shapes reality around me.
- user-the-name 5y ago
  So today we are making excuses for authoritarians kidnapping opposition members, huh.
- trhway 5y ago
  >don't mess with Lucashenko and then you can fly over there just fine the world is full of Lukashenko-s. We've all been critical of Saudis/MBS for example. What happens if your plane unexpectedly lands for some technical reason in Saudi Arabia and they check your internet postings? I'm pretty sure that that Internet criticism of MBS is a crime in SA. May be they wouldn't touch a US citizen, yet they would have no issues with a Russian, or any other shithole country, citizen like me.
varjag 5y ago
I'm in the same spot. When I was leaving the country after then-"election" in 2006, I had to wait until the engineer I was handing the project over to finished his 30-day prison sentence. This year even my ever optimistic friends who were never intent to move have been sent packing. The hijacking makes things even worse for the unwillingly growing Belarusian diaspora, but there should not be mucking around. I advocate for the strongest pushback possible, even though anticipating a lacklustre response.
- proxysna 5y ago
  My close circle of friends, mostly moved to nearby countries Estonia, Ukraine, Poland and even Russia. One family has returned because they got homesick and being an immigrant is generally hard. But no one is planning to stay in Belarus, right now you can't be sure that tommorow you won't become a criminal without any guilt of your own and it is not getting any better. And anything that hurts regime is worth it, no matter how anemic it might seem, in the long run it is all worth it.
  - varjag 5y ago
    Aye. And in my age cohort noone really emigrates unless they are really compelled by circumstances. But now it appears we're getting some pushback from the EU. Less than I hoped (so far), but more than I feared.
jcaldas 5y ago
Lukashenko will not go down without a fight, and Russia is very unwilling to see a color revolution again next to its borders. Putin dreams of annexing Belarus. Couple this with the EU's overall weakness and fragmented interests (eg nordstream 2), and it's hard to imagine a good outcome. A few sanctions will come out of this that will make EU officials look good and further place Belarus into Russian hands (namely, as you wrote, making Belarus airspace dependent on Russian airspace). Let's see what the real leader of the EU has to say. If the EU can't stand for the people of Belarus, for the sake of freedom and human rights, then it will have once again failed.
- fpoling 5y ago
  It is not that clear that Russia all that happy about the incident. A girlfriend of Roman Protasevich, who is a Russian citizen, was also detained and that already caused PR issues for Kremlin. Plus there is even comments from Russia’s Duma about how this can be damaging for Russia.
  - varjag 5y ago
    No, the head propagandists (RT's Simonyan, Solovyev) are ecstatic and can't stop congratulating KGB.
  - piokoch 5y ago
    Protasevich was tracked in many countries before he entered this plane, tracked by someone doing that very professionally engaging a lot of resources. It is hard to imagine Belarus was doing this alone, without Russia support.
- proxysna 5y ago
  No one will stand for Belarus. Sanctions have the effect of running Belarus into Russian\Chinese debt pit even further. Until the military sides with opposition (it won't) there will be no changes at all. Even if military gets involved, there will be russian "voluteers" (see Russian volunteers in Moldova 90, Balkans 92-01, Chechnya 93, Ukraine 14 ) that are there to help fight new "junta". And then it will result in Ukraine II: electric boogaloo. Eastern Belarus is de-facto a part of Smolensk oblast' with some Russia funded murderers creating an "independent" republic. This was played out to death over the last 30 years. And don't get me wrong. All while this will be happening, EU will be very concerned, that is for sure. None of this will happen ofc, because all resistance will be suppressed with excessive force, at the very start. No trials, no judges.

arodyginc 5y ago

tldr: don't mess with Lucashenko and then you can fly over there just fine

proxysna 5y ago
Yeah sure, state funded terrorism does not affect you until it does
golergka 5y ago
I think that majority of HN readers, being from US and Europe, don't realise how many people from the shithole countries actually think like that and don't see anything wrong with this statement. And yes, I'm using the Trump's derogatory words here. I was born and still live in such a shithole country, and I'm incredibly angry and at it and this shithole mentality that shapes reality around me.
user-the-name 5y ago
So today we are making excuses for authoritarians kidnapping opposition members, huh.
trhway 5y ago
>don't mess with Lucashenko and then you can fly over there just fine the world is full of Lukashenko-s. We've all been critical of Saudis/MBS for example. What happens if your plane unexpectedly lands for some technical reason in Saudi Arabia and they check your internet postings? I'm pretty sure that that Internet criticism of MBS is a crime in SA. May be they wouldn't touch a US citizen, yet they would have no issues with a Russian, or any other shithole country, citizen like me.

varjag 5y ago

I'm in the same spot. When I was leaving the country after then-"election" in 2006, I had to wait until the engineer I was handing the project over to finished his 30-day prison sentence. This year even my ever optimistic friends who were never intent to move have been sent packing. The hijacking makes things even worse for the unwillingly growing Belarusian diaspora, but there should not be mucking around. I advocate for the strongest pushback possible, even though anticipating a lacklustre response.

proxysna 5y ago
My close circle of friends, mostly moved to nearby countries Estonia, Ukraine, Poland and even Russia. One family has returned because they got homesick and being an immigrant is generally hard. But no one is planning to stay in Belarus, right now you can't be sure that tommorow you won't become a criminal without any guilt of your own and it is not getting any better. And anything that hurts regime is worth it, no matter how anemic it might seem, in the long run it is all worth it.
- varjag 5y ago
  Aye. And in my age cohort noone really emigrates unless they are really compelled by circumstances. But now it appears we're getting some pushback from the EU. Less than I hoped (so far), but more than I feared.

jcaldas 5y ago

Lukashenko will not go down without a fight, and Russia is very unwilling to see a color revolution again next to its borders. Putin dreams of annexing Belarus. Couple this with the EU's overall weakness and fragmented interests (eg nordstream 2), and it's hard to imagine a good outcome. A few sanctions will come out of this that will make EU officials look good and further place Belarus into Russian hands (namely, as you wrote, making Belarus airspace dependent on Russian airspace). Let's see what the real leader of the EU has to say. If the EU can't stand for the people of Belarus, for the sake of freedom and human rights, then it will have once again failed.

fpoling 5y ago
It is not that clear that Russia all that happy about the incident. A girlfriend of Roman Protasevich, who is a Russian citizen, was also detained and that already caused PR issues for Kremlin. Plus there is even comments from Russia’s Duma about how this can be damaging for Russia.
- varjag 5y ago
  No, the head propagandists (RT's Simonyan, Solovyev) are ecstatic and can't stop congratulating KGB.
- piokoch 5y ago
  Protasevich was tracked in many countries before he entered this plane, tracked by someone doing that very professionally engaging a lot of resources. It is hard to imagine Belarus was doing this alone, without Russia support.
proxysna 5y ago
No one will stand for Belarus. Sanctions have the effect of running Belarus into Russian\Chinese debt pit even further. Until the military sides with opposition (it won't) there will be no changes at all. Even if military gets involved, there will be russian "voluteers" (see Russian volunteers in Moldova 90, Balkans 92-01, Chechnya 93, Ukraine 14 ) that are there to help fight new "junta". And then it will result in Ukraine II: electric boogaloo. Eastern Belarus is de-facto a part of Smolensk oblast' with some Russia funded murderers creating an "independent" republic. This was played out to death over the last 30 years. And don't get me wrong. All while this will be happening, EU will be very concerned, that is for sure. None of this will happen ofc, because all resistance will be suppressed with excessive force, at the very start. No trials, no judges.