Cancelled Vienna-Moscow flight: Austria slams Russia

Vienna: Austria on Thursday slammed Russia after it refused to allow an Austrian Airlines flight to be rerouted to avoid Belarusian airspace, resulting in the Vienna-Moscow service being cancelled.

Austria’s foreign ministry said Russia’s refusal to allow the route change was "absolutely incomprehensible", urging it "not to artificially impede free air traffic between Russia and Europe".

"It is in the interests of both Austria and Russia that all flights to and via Russia can continue to be carried out without any problems," it said in a statement to AFP. Austrian Airlines cancelled the Vienna-Moscow flight on Thursday, saying Russian authorities had not approved a route change allowing the plane to avoid Belarusian airspace.

The airline said it had suspended flights over Belarusian airspace in line with a recommendation by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), making a route change for the Vienna-Moscow flight necessary.

"A change in flight routes must be approved by the authorities. The Russian authorities did not give us this permission," the airline said in a statement to AFP. It added it was not yet clear if the next flight would be able to take place. A Moscow-Vienna flight is scheduled for Friday.

Passengers on the cancelled flight were rebooked, the airline said. Russia’s transport ministry told AFP that it had "no comment for now". Belarus sparked global fury by diverting an Athens-to-Vilnius Ryanair plane on Sunday and arresting an exiled dissident in Minsk.

There is no evidence that Belarusian KGB or any other secret service agents were on the Athens-to-Vilnius Ryanair flight that was diverted to Minsk in order to arrest a dissident on board, Greece’s prime minister said on Thursday.

"We have no indication there were KGB agents or any security service agents on board the plane. None. Zero. And we investigated it very carefully," Kyriakos Mitsotakis said in an interview with Germany’s Bild tabloid.

The incident on Sunday, which led to the detention of opposition journalist Roman Protasevich and his companion Sofia Sapega, has triggered international condemnation. The European Union has since banned Belarusian planes from the bloc’s airspace and urged EU airlines to avoid flying over the ex-Soviet country.

Mitsotakis said the plane diversion, which Belarus claimed was due to a supposed bomb threat, was "an act of state-sponsored piracy" with the sole purpose of arresting Protasevich.