BEIRUT // Lebanon has rejected a Russian request to divert flights over Lebanese airspace for three days because of naval exercises in the Mediterranean Sea, the transport minister said on Friday.
“We refused it because it is against our interests,” said Ghazi Zeaiter.
Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported earlier that the country’s airspace would be closed to civilian flights for three days from midnight on Friday because of the Russian drills.
The closure, it said, would halt flights in and out of Lebanon’s only international airport, located in the capital, Beirut.
It said authorities were conducting negotiations with the nearby island of Cyprus to redirect flights, but that most airlines were likely to simply cancel their flights.
The announcement of the potential disruptions was sudden, coming only six hours before Lebanon’s airspace was due to shut down.
Lebanese foreign minister Gebran Bassil held talks in Moscow with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov on Wednesday, but no announcement was made then of a Russian request to close Lebanon’s airspace.
The Russian defence ministry refused to comment on Friday.
Russia has built up its military presence in the Middle East since entering Syria’s civil war in late September with an air campaign against rebel groups and extremists. Moscow has launched flights from a base in Syria’s Latakia province and fired cruise missiles from ships in the Caspian Sea.
On Tuesday, Russian president Vladimir Putin ordered his country’s naval assets in the Mediterranean Sea to establish contact with French forces and work together with them against ISIL in Syria.
Initial reports of the airspace closure prompted criticism on social media from Lebanese who said it violated the country’s sovereignty.
“It looks like they consider Lebanon as a district of Moscow, infringing and insulting our sovereignty,” tweeted Walid Jumblatt, leader of the Druze Progressive Socialist Party and a prominent politician.
* With additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
