A Ryanair aircraft. File photoWASHINGTON, Jul 20The Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) found that the information about the bomb on board the Ryanair plane that made an emergency landing in Minsk was deliberately false and was passed on to the flight crew at the direction of the Belarusian authorities, according to an ICAO report released on Tuesday. «The ICAO Council acknowledged that the report of a bomb planted on Ryanair flight FR4978 was deliberately false and threatened its safety, and that information about this threat was brought to the attention of the flight crew at the direction of senior officials of the government of Belarus,» the document states. The report states that » neither the bomb nor evidence of its existence was found, both during the inspection before the plane took off from Athens, and subsequently after numerous inspections of the aircraft in Belarus and Lithuania. Thus, ICAO concluded that the bomb threat «was obviously false», which jeopardized the safety of the aircraft. A Ryanair aircraft flying from Athens to Vilnius made an emergency landing at Minsk Airport on May 23, 2021 due to a report of mining which was not subsequently confirmed. On board was Roman Protasevich, the founder of the Telegram channel Nexta, recognized as extremist in Belarus. When checking documents, he was detained and a criminal case was opened under several articles, including the article «organization of mass riots.» After the incident, European countries said that the Belarusian authorities forced the plane to land under a far-fetched pretext. This was denied in Minsk, arguing that they only recommended landing, and the decision was made by the pilot. After the incident, some airlines began to bypass the airspace of Belarus. The European Union has banned the use of Belarusian air carriers of its airspace and airports by planes. ICAO has launched an investigation into the incident. The organization submitted a report that the information about the bombing of a Ryanair plane that made an emergency landing in Minsk last year was false, but did not attribute its distribution to any state. Later, ICAO reported that after reviewing the incident investigation report, a number of member countries were concerned about alleged gaps in the information provided by Belarus. They were also confused by the inconsistencies in the evidence available at the time of the investigation of the Ryanair incident, in terms of critical aspects of the actual reconstruction of events. It was decided to continue the investigation of the incident. In February, Belarusian Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei announced an attempt by Western countries to put pressure on ICAO so that the organization would issue the conclusion they needed on the incident with the Ryanair aircraft. Later, Artem Sikorsky, director of the aviation department of the Belarusian Ministry of Transport and Communications, said that ICAO could finalize the emergency 
Lukashenko reacted to the ICAO report on the Ryanair incident
