MINSK. Oct 26 (Interfax) - The presentation of the final report of the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) dealing with the Ryanair flight's emergency landing in Minsk may be postponed until February 2022, the Belarusian Transport Ministry said.
"On October 25, 2021, the ICAO Council reviewed the interim report on the results of the ICAO group's investigation into the landing of Ryanair's flight FR 4978. It was noted in the report that the Belarusian side provided a large number of documents, audio and video materials, but the working group still needs more time to establish all circumstances of the incident that occurred on May 23, 2021. It was also noted that there is no certainty that the group will be able to prepare the final report during the ongoing 224th session and that its presentation may be postponed until the next session in February 2022," the ministry said.
Belarus has once again asked ICAO to provide monitoring data from that Ryanair flight, it said.
"This information is needed in order to establish why the captain of that aircraft decided to land the plane in Minsk. These materials will be added to the results of the interdepartmental working group's investigation and will also be forwarded to the Investigative Committee of Belarus as part of this criminal investigation," the ministry said.
The ICAO Council "has called on all countries to assist each other with the investigation," it said.
The ICAO Secretariat's preliminary report regarding the emergency landing of the Ryanair flight in Minsk on May 23 of this year was reviewed on October 25. The report, however, did not contain any specific conclusions regarding the cause of the incident.
ICAO experts visited Belarus in late August and held a meeting at the Belarusian Ministry of Transport and Communications.
On May 23, a Ryanair flight from Athens to Vilnius was forced to land in Minsk. Among the passengers was Belarusian opposition activist Roman Protasevich.
Ryanair said the landing had been requested by Belarusian air traffic controllers due to a bomb alert. That information later proved to be a hoax.
The incident caused international uproar. In particular, on June 5, the European Union banned Belarusian airlines from flying over EU countries and using European airports.