The Regime’s Transnational Crimes: from Air Piracy to Hybrid Warfare
- Admin of the NAM
- Dec 2
- 2 min read
The criminal activity of the Lukashenko regime is not confined to Belarus. It has evolved from persecuting the diaspora to acts threatening international security. These actions give the international community far more legal tools to respond, as they directly involve the jurisdiction of other states.
Episode 1: The Ryanair Hijacking (State Air Piracy)
On 23 May 2021, Belarusian authorities, under a false bomb threat and with a MiG-29 fighter jet, forced a civilian aircraft flying from Athens to Vilnius to land in Minsk to arrest Raman Pratasevich.
Legal qualification:
Gross violation of the 1944 Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation.
Act of unlawful interference under the 1971 Montreal Convention.
Official Minsk’s position:
Belarus insisted on the narrative of a “Hamas email.”Aviation official Artem Sikorski claimed dispatchers acted “recommendationally.”
But ICAO’s final report (July 2022) fully debunked Minsk’s claims, concluding that the bomb threat was deliberately false and constituted unlawful interference by Belarusian authorities.
Historical precedent:
Lockerbie bombing (1988).It led to international isolation of Libya, UN sanctions, and eventual extradition of suspects. Crimes against international aviation carry extremely high political cost.
Episode 2: The Instrumentalized Migration Crisis
Since summer 2021, Belarusian authorities arranged the transport of thousands of migrants from the Middle East to Minsk and then forced or manipulated them into storming the borders of Poland and Lithuania.
Legal qualification:
Violation of UN Palermo Protocols against transnational organized crime, especially the Protocol against migrant smuggling.
Potential crime against humanity (Article 7(1)(k) Rome Statute): people were deliberately used as human shields, exposed to suffering and death — documented by Amnesty International.
Official Minsk’s position:
“The West is responsible” — EU allegedly “bombed” the migrants’ home countries.
“Poland is cruel” — propaganda highlights Polish border guard actions.
“Sanctions weakened control” — Minsk claims it “cannot contain” the flows.
Accountability mechanisms
The transnational nature of these crimes opens legal pathways unavailable for domestic repression cases.
1. National jurisdiction of affected states
Poland and Lithuania can fully investigate:
the migration crisis as hybrid aggression,
the Ryanair incident — the plane was headed for Vilnius and registered in Poland.
2. ICC jurisdiction via “cross-border completion”
Despite Belarus not being a Rome Statute member, Poland and Lithuania are.
Precedent: Myanmar/Bangladesh case.ICC ruled it has jurisdiction over deportation because the crime is completed on the territory of a member state.Likewise, forced movement of migrants ends in Poland/Lithuania, enabling potential ICC investigation.
3. Lithuania’s case before the ICJ
Lithuania has sued Belarus at the International Court of Justice for violating the UN Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants, asserting that Minsk deliberately organized and directed migrant flows toward the EU.
Conclusion
By attacking its neighbours, the Lukashenko regime itself placed powerful legal tools into their hands. It stepped outside the shelter of sovereignty and fell under direct jurisdiction of EU courts and, potentially, The Hague.
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