What was behind a jet's diversion to Belarus?

The diversion of a Ryanair flight to Lithuania by Belarus, leading to the arrest of an opposition journalist who was a passenger, has sparked international outrage and calls for tough sanctions against the former Soviet nation.

Ryanair Flight FR4978, traveling Sunday from Athens to the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius, was in Belarus airspace about 6 miles from the Lithuanian border when it changed direction and turned toward the Belarusian capital of Minsk. Ryanair said Belarusian flight controllers told the pilots that there was a bomb threat against the jetliner and ordered them to land in Minsk. The Belarusian military scrambled a MiG-29 fighter jet in an apparent attempt to encourage the crew to comply with the orders of flight controllers. Once the plane landed, Belarusian security agents arrested Raman Pratasevich, who ran a popular messaging app that helped organize mass demonstrations against President Alexander Lukashenko, Belarus’ authoritarian leader. They also removed from the plane Pratasevich’s Russian girlfriend, Sofia Sapega, who studies at a Vilnius university.