KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Belarus has retaliated to the European Union sanctions by halting cooperation on stemming illegal migration and denying entry to EU officials. The EU on Thursday slapped new bruising economic sanctions on Belarus over last month’s diversion of a passenger jet to arrest a dissident journalist. Belarus’ authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko has denounced the EU sanctions as part a “hybrid war” waged by the West against Belarus. The Belarusian Foreign Ministry said Monday that Belarus would move to suspend a readmission agreement with the EU that is intended to stem illegal migration. The ministry said that the country will also deny entry to unspecified EU officials, recall its envoy to the EU and ask the EU representative to leave Minsk.
