“Dissident journalist Roman Protasevich has appeared in a new video after his arrest by Belarusian authorities on Sunday, following the government’s extraordinary diversion of his Ryanair flight to capital city Minsk … ‘The attitude of the [Interior Ministry] employees towards me has been as correct as possible and in compliance with the law. I continue to cooperate with the investigation and have confessed to organizing mass riots in the city of Minsk.'”

+ “Belarus’ isolation deepened Tuesday as commercial planes avoided its airspace, the European Union worked up new sanctions, and a U.N. official said he was concerned for the welfare of an opposition journalist arrested in Minsk after being pulled off a plane that was diverted there in what the West called a state-sponsored hijacking.” (Can isolating a country move a dictator who’s only interested in his own power?)

+ “Lukashenko is now totally dependent on Putin for his survival in office and would not have risked his relationship with the Kremlin by undertaking such a cavalier move unless he had been first given the green light by Putin.” Russia’s power over Belarus is in the spotlight after plane ‘hijacking’ incident. This is just one more topic for Biden to bring up during his summit with Putin that’s been scheduled for next month.