Seems like bureaucratic symbolism. I can't imagine there are many people who want to avoid being nabbed in Belarus but would still feel comfortable traveling to Russia.
I saw a televised meeting between Putin and Lukashenko yesterday that ended with Lukashenko making the statement that went something like "the Bolsheviks rose to great heights, and we will match them", to which Putin chuckled, demurely. Its maybe not obvious to Westerners, but they are trying to rebuild a "Union of ex-Soviet States" in the region these days .. one by one, preparing a Bloc that can be an attractive partner to the EU, I suppose.
With these kinds of tit-for-tat responses, though, I guess its a shrewd strategy. "If we are allowed into the EU econo-bloc, such re-routes won't be necessary", seems to be the planned negotiating point ..
This is a cogent observation.
Putin has stated multiple times that he intends to have better relations with the EU, and that the Commonwealth of Independent States needs to work towards that goal, so .. I'm guessing you're not paying attention to that, since it doesn't serve the narrative that Russia just wants to 'go it alone against the world'.
https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/putin-sa...
No, it wouldn't be good for the USA, but it would be great for Europeans and Russians to see this happen some day.
Russia would be a perfectly fine partner with the EU, and it seems to be orienting towards that goal in a future date - American agitprop notwithstanding.
It takes a certain kind of disingenuous authoritarianism to claim that Russia is committing heinous acts which preclude its participation in the world order, when the majority of the world order is just fine with crimes against humanity, war crimes, and extrajudicial assassinations being performed for the criminal purposes of the "Coalition of the Willing".
Fair enough if you want to criticize Russia for being a kleptocracy that assassinates enemies on foreign soil, but diversion of flights to capture enemies of the state and then not treating them well in captivity is unfortunately not a hallmark of totalitarian regimes but a general feature of western statecraft as well, so let's not blow this tit-for-tat response out of proportion.
Practically I view the fly over ban as protecting passengers and property from being unduly seized by Belarus.
Since Belarus and Russia have close ties flying a plane into Russia at all seems about the same risk as flying that plane over and into Belarus.
Isn't that great? We're not going to allow non-democratic countries like Russia into the EU. Certainly not when they are so clearly documenting that they have zero credibility, no treaty Russia signs can be trusted. So it's probably fine that they make own club.
I mean what else would we expect them to do?