[ad_1]
French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday that the arrest of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov in Paris on Saturday had nothing to do with restricting freedom of expression.
Durov is a Russian citizen who acquired French citizenship in 2021. Durov was arrested in Paris on Saturday on multiple charges, including organized fraud and distributing pornographic images of minors, according to a press release signed by Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau and sent to Euractiv on Monday.
The tech mogul’s detention was extended on Sunday (August 25), meaning he will be held for up to 96 hours for questioning, after which the judge can decide to release the Telegram CEO or press charges, which would extend his detention.
The Russian Embassy in France urged France to release the tech entrepreneur despite Durov’s exile in the UAE In X.
According to Russian News Agency RIA NovostiAlexey Nechayev, a former member of the Central Committee of Putin’s party and current leader of the New People’s Party of Russia, sent a letter on Sunday (August 25) supporting “the demand for the immediate release of Pavel Durov.”
The letter, addressed to political heavyweights including far-right leader Marine Le Pen (National Rally, European Patriots) and radical leftist Jean-Luc Mélenchon (France Indomitable, Left), criticised the precedent that could destroy “people’s privacy and freedom of expression”.
“No one has received the letter,” Virginie Joron, a member of the National Assembly, told Euractiv.
A spokesman for Mélenchon’s “Unbowed France” organization responded to European Events magazine that they also knew nothing about the letter.
But Joron’s party take out In 2014, it obtained a loan of 9.4 million euros from a Russian bank. support French President Emmanuel Macron, who is holding snap parliamentary elections in France in July, said the move echoed concerns expressed by Russian officials and questioned the motives of French authorities in arresting Durov.
She stressed that her party would “closely follow the case, especially with regard to the protection of individual liberties” and free speech.
Since Durov’s arrest, French authorities have been criticised for allegedly restricting free speech, including from billionaire X owner Elon Musk and conspiracy theorist and former US presidential candidate Robert Kennedy Jr.
Telegram complies with EU law and its moderation meets industry standards and is constantly improving. Written on X On Sunday.
The post added: “It is absurd to claim that a platform or (Pavel Durov) is responsible for the abuse of the platform.”
But Miriam Buiten, a researcher at the European Center for Regulatory Studies, told the European Activities Center that “it is highly problematic that a perfectly legitimate criminal proceeding has been wrongly labeled as a restriction on free speech, as has been repeatedly claimed.”
Buiten added: “If other companies were involved in criminal offences such as selling drugs or sharing child sexual abuse material, people would not perceive free speech as being restricted.”
For Macron, there is a lot of “fake news” about Durov’s arrest, the president said. Written on X Monday (August 26).
He went on to write that France respects freedom of expression and that Durov’s arrest was “part of an ongoing judicial investigation.”
“This is by no means a political decision. It is up to the judge to decide,” he added.
Debate on the Digital Services Act
Although Telegram has become one of the most successful messaging apps with 900 million users worldwide and plans to reach 1 billion users by the end of 2024, it claims to have less than 45 million monthly active users in the EU.
Those numbers prevent the platform from being designated a “very large online platform” (VLOP), meaning it would have to comply with extensive obligations under the Digital Services Act (DSA), the EU’s landmark law on online content moderation.
A Commission spokesperson told Euractiv that the Commission is still “investigating Telegram’s methods.”
However, because Telegram’s service sits somewhere between a messaging app and a social media platform, calculating total monthly users is more difficult, Buiten explained.
But a Commission spokesperson told Euractiv that Telegram is still subject to its obligations under the DSA, “including when they learn of serious criminal conduct or receive an order to provide information about accounts suspected of criminal activity”.
However, as long as Telegram is not considered a VLOP, it must comply with the regulations of national authorities rather than those of the European Commission.
Telegram opened its EU headquarters in Brussels in May.
(Editing by Daniel Ek)
Read more by Euractiv
[ad_2]
Source link
