Merkel: Twitter’s decision to block Trump’s account is problematic



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“The fundamental right to freedom of opinion is a fundamental fundamental right that can be restricted, but only by law, within the framework defined by legislators, and not by the decision of the leaders of social media platforms,” ​​said the Chancellor Steffen Seibert.

“In this context, the chancellor considers the permanent blocking of the accounts of the president of the United States problematic,” the spokesman said in a statement.

He argued that lying or inciting violence was also “very problematic”, but that the State should create a legal regulatory framework to combat these problems.

Full regulation by blocking accounts transcends borders, Seibert said. He said, however, that he supports the initiative that social networks have taken in recent months to flag false statements.

On Friday, Twitter announced that it was permanently blocking Trump’s account due to the continued risk of violence after his supporters broke into the Capitol building.

The French government criticizes the decision

The French government considers it necessary to combat hate propaganda on social media, but does not support blocking US President Donald Trump’s account on Twitter.

“I am not happy with this decision,” government spokesman Gabriel Attalis was quoted as saying by French media.

He stressed the importance of “combating hate propaganda, with publications calling for violence”, but described the controversial decision of “forcing a person to remain silent on social networks that have become a form of public space.”

For her part, the French Minister of Ecology, Barbara Pompili, said that “cases in which the social network decides for itself what to block should not become the norm.”

The European Commissioner for the Internal Market, Thierry Breton of France, expressed surprise that the company could, independently, without further action, block the account of the US president.
“The fact that the CEO of the company can immediately turn off the speaker of the president is surprising. This not only confirms the power of these platforms. It shows how weakly organized our society is in the digital space ”, writes Th. Breton in an article published by the Politico newspaper.

According to the politician, the social networks and the companies to which they belong must recognize their responsibility for the decisions they make.

After the world shocks on January 6. During the events at the United States Capitol, many social networks, including Twitter and Facebook, blocked Trump’s accounts out of fear that his posts could lead to another outbreak of violence.

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