Lithuanian leaders say Protasevich’s confession may be forced
Lithuania’s president and foreign minister have spoken out about the video allegedly showing Roman Protasvich, the Belarusian journalist who was detained after the regime hijacked a Vilnius-bound Ryanair flight, may have been obtained using torture.
“Knowing how such confessions are obtained from people, we don’t buy it as a real statement,” she told Žinių Radijas radio on Tuesday. “But the person is alive and that’s the good news.”
Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said the video shows that the confession may have been obtained using torture.
“I’m not the only one who thinks that he may have been forced, through violence, to say these words,” Landsbergis told LRT RADIO on Tuesday. “We can see abrasions on his face, which leave suspicions whether he wasn’t forced [to confess], tortured.”
In a video circulated by Belarus' state TV channels on Monday, Belarusian blogger Roman Protasevich, detained when an Athens-to-Vilnius Ryanair flight he was on was forced to land in Minsk, says he is in good health and that he played a role in organising mass protests in Minsk last year.
