ST. PETERSBURG, June 4. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that he does not want to delve into the Ryanair passenger plane’s emergency landing in Minsk.
"I do not have the slightest wish to delve into the affair. You know, we have nothing to do with it at all," Putin said in reply to a question at a plenary meeting of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum on Friday.
He said he had no idea about what exactly had happened to that plane or about the alleged bomb threat and had no wish to make judgements on the political processes afoot in Belarus.
"The truth always lies somewhere in the middle. It is better not to intervene, to let people sort things out without haste," Putin said. "Anyway, whatever there is, whatever some might say that some regime suppresses something, you know, changes in any society will proceed in accordance with the objective circumstances of that society’s development. You should never intervene."
In connection with the Ryanair plane incident Putin recalled that the plane of Bolivia’s President Evo Morales was forced to land in Vienna in 2013.
"Nobody recalls this, as if there was nothing like that. But it did happen. Incidentally, such things happened many times. And not only to the plane of that president," Putin said. "For some reason in this particular case the incident has drawn such great attention. And it is very clear why. This means that what is happening in Belarus has not only drawn attention. Many of our neighbors would like to exert influence. I am not saying that this should be left unnoticed, but meddling in somebody else’s affairs is wrong".
