It’s the reason why Lavrov’s plane did not fly over Bulgaria

The spokeswoman of the Russian MFA, Maria Zakharova, called the decision of the Bulgarian authorities to deny Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s plane from flying through the country’s airspace if she herself was on board “dangerous”.

“It is not just about stupidity, but about the dangerous stupidity of some intriguer in the power structures of Bulgaria. The fact is that the rules of air traffic are regulated by the Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation of 1944. It prescribes the territory of the state should be understood as “land territories and adjacent to them except territorial waters.” Airspace is not included in the term “territory”. , which is prohibited from entering the territory of the state,” wrote Zakharova on the Telegram channel. According to her, for the first time in the whole country, the state authorities banned not a plane, but a person in the plane from being in the sky, because according to the note of the Bulgarian diplomatic department, the plane of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs was allowed to fly over it.

“Did the Bulgarian officials think that such measures could be implemented in response to the thousands of NATO operatives who are on our mirror stop lists? Did they think about setting a dangerous world precedent in principle? I think not. in Sofia to disgrace the Bulgarian people? …We, by the way, are already in Skopje,” Zakharova added.

Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov arrived in the capital of North Macedonia, Skopje, to participate in the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). The plane was flying through Greece, and before that the route was expected to pass through Bulgaria. As TASS has learned, the Bulgarian side has refused to let the plane of the Russian foreign minister go if Zakharova is on board.

The note from the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry, states in particular: “Permission to participate in the above-mentioned meeting in Skopje is granted to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Sergey Lavrov and his accompanying delegation in accordance with the note … The decision does not refers to the director of the information and press department of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova, who is on the list of sanctions, in accordance with EU legislation.”

The length of the ministerial plane’s route was about 4,000 km, the journey lasting more than five hours. Lavrov’s plane flew over Turkey and Greece on the way to North Macedonia.

Illustrative Photo by Lubov Tandit: https://www.pexels.com/photo/people-walking-on-concrete-road-with-mid-rise-buildings-under-clouded-sky-92412/