NewsRescue
Twitter CEO Elon Musk has replied to reports that the Indian government threatened to shut down the social media network unless specific posts were filtered. The billionaire stated that his company must follow local regulations or risk losing customers.
Musk was asked to react on charges made by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey regarding the Indian government’s purported pressure on the social media site following a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New York City on Tuesday, where the two discussed constructing a Tesla factory in India.
The businessman said, “Twitter doesn’t have a choice but to obey local governments.” “We will be shut down if we do not obey local government laws,” Musk warned reporters.
“The best we can do is follow the laws of any given country,” he added, adding that it is impossible for “us to do more than that.”
Musk acknowledged that governments had different norms and regulations, but he emphasised that Twitter “will do its best to provide the freest speech possible under the law.”
His remarks come after Dorsey stated last week that New Delhi was pressuring Twitter to block posts about the 2021 Indian farmers’ protests and to blacklist journalists who were critical of the Indian government.
“‘We would raid your employees’ homes,’ which they did; we will close your offices if you do not follow suit.” “And this is India, which is a democratic country,” Dorsey asserted.
The Indian government, for its part, has categorically disputed Dorsey’s charges and accused Twitter of breaching local regulations. In a tweet last week, Rajeev Chandresekhar, India’s Deputy Minister for Information Technology, labelled the former CEO’s assertions a “outright lie.”
“No one was arrested, and Twitter was not’shut down.’ Dorsey’s Twitter administration has difficulty acknowledging Indian law’s sovereignty. It acted as if Indian laws did not apply to it,” he wrote.
Meanwhile, a fresh series of hacked emails suggests that the FBI, working with Ukrainian intelligence, did indeed force Twitter to deactivate more than 160 accounts that Kiev’s officials believed to be “spreading fear and disinformation.” Accounts belonging to RT and other Russian media sites, as well as American and Canadian journalists, were among those targeted, according to reporter Aaron Mate.
