Germany's Lufthansa Received Russia's Permit For Flights Bypassing Belarus

German air carrier Lufthansa has received permission from the Russian authorities to conduct flights to Moscow and St. Petersburg that will bypass Belarus, the company told Sputnik on Saturday

BERLIN (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 29th May, 2021) German air carrier Lufthansa has received permission from the Russian authorities to conduct flights to Moscow and St. Petersburg that will bypass Belarus, the company told Sputnik on Saturday.

"Yes, this is absolutely true," a spokesperson replied to a relevant question from Sputnik.

Lufthansa has seven flights to the Domodedovo airport in Moscow and four flights to the Pulkovo airport in St. Petersburg in its weekly schedule.

According to the company's press release, all airlines belonging to the Lufthansa Group currently avoid Belarusian airspace.

The EU has recommended that its carriers avoid flying over Belarus following an incident last week when a Ryanair flight traveling from Greece to Lithuania had to make an emergency landing in Minsk over a bomb threat, which turned out to have been fake.

One of its passengers, Roman Protasevich, a co-founder of a Telegram channel that Minsk has designated as extremist, was detained during the stopover at the airport along with Russian citizen Sofia Sapega.

Despite Belarus maintaining that its air traffic controllers put no pressure on the crew to ground the plane, the incident prompted outrage in the West.