French, IndonesiaSentinel.com — Pavel Durov, the Russian-French billionaire and Telegram CEO, was arrested at Bourget Airport outside Paris on Saturday night, August 24, 2024, according to reports from French media outlets TF1 TV and BFM TV, citing unnamed sources.
Durov, who was traveling on a private jet, was reportedly detained under a French arrest warrant as part of an initial police investigation. The investigation is said to focus on Telegram’s lack of moderation, which authorities believe has allowed criminal activities to go unchecked on the platform.
According to French media, Durov could face charges as early as Sunday, August 25, 2024, Reuters reported.
Telegram, an encrypted messaging platform with nearly a billion users, is highly influential in Russia, Ukraine, and other former Soviet states. It ranks as one of the major social media platforms globally, alongside Facebook, YouTube, WhatsApp, Instagram, TikTok, and WeChat.
Telegram did not immediately respond to Reuters‘ request for comment, and neither the French Ministry of the Interior nor the police offered any statements on the arrest.
Born in Russia, Durov co-founded Telegram with his brother in 2013. He left Russia in 2014 after refusing to comply with government demands to shut down opposition groups on his social media platform VKontakte, which he later sold.
“I prefer to be free than to take orders from anyone,” Durov told U.S. journalist Tucker Carlson in April, discussing his departure from Russia and the search for a headquarters for his company, which has included stops in Berlin, London, Singapore, and San Francisco.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Telegram has become a major source of unfiltered—and sometimes graphic and misleading—content from both sides of the conflict. The platform has been dubbed a “virtual battleground” by analysts, with heavy usage by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his officials, as well as by the Russian government.
Telegram, which allows users to evade official surveillance, remains one of the few avenues for Russians to access independent news about the war after the Kremlin tightened restrictions on the independent press following the invasion of Ukraine.
Russia’s foreign ministry stated that its embassy in Paris is working to clarify the situation surrounding Durov and has called on Western NGOs to demand his release.
In 2018, Russia attempted to block Telegram after the app refused to comply with a court order to provide state security services access to users’ encrypted messages. Although the ban disrupted many third-party services, it had little effect on Telegram’s availability in Russia, sparking mass protests in Moscow and criticism from NGOs.
TF1 reported that Durov, who resides in Dubai, had traveled from Azerbaijan and was arrested around 8:00 PM local time.
Durov, whose wealth is estimated by Forbes at $15.5 billion, has stated that while several governments have attempted to pressure him, the app must remain a “neutral platform” and not a “player in geopolitics.”
Telegram’s growing popularity has attracted scrutiny from several European countries, including France, over security and data privacy concerns. Mikhail Ulyanov, Russia’s representative to international organizations in Vienna, and other Russian politicians quickly accused France of acting like a dictatorship on Sunday—a similar criticism faced by Moscow when it targeted Durov in 2014 and attempted to ban Telegram in 2018.
“Some naive people still don’t understand that if they play a more or less visible role in the international information space, it’s not safe for them to visit countries moving towards a far more totalitarian society,” Ulyanov wrote on X.
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Elon Musk, billionaire owner of X (formerly Twitter), commented on the situation after news of Durov’s detention broke: “It’s now 2030 in Europe, and you’re executed for liking a meme.”
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who dropped out of the U.S. presidential race on Friday, August 23, 2024, to endorse Republican Donald Trump, stated on X following the reports that the need to protect free speech “has never been more urgent.” Several Russian bloggers have called for protests at French embassies worldwide at noon on Sunday.
(Ray)
