Russia Accuses West of Free Speech Hypocrisy Over Telegram Founder’s Arrest

Russia has lashed out at the perceived silence of the West over the arrest of Telegram founder Pavel Durov, saying it shows the West’s two-faced approach to freedom of expression.

“Tens of millions of social media users are outraged, as are many independent public figures, while the neoliberal elites remain deathly silent,” Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday.

Durov, a Saint Petersburg-born French citizen whom Politico dubbed “Russia’s Elon Musk,” co-founded the cloud-based messaging service Telegram with his brother in 2013.

On August 24, French authorities detain the tech billionaire upon his arrival at Paris–Le Bourget Airport from Azerbaijan.

His arrest concerned illicit activity that French prosecutor Laure Beccuau alleged had been allowed to take place on Telegram, including drug trafficking and the distribution of child sexual abuse images, and the platform’s refusal to share information with authorities when requested.

Durov has since been released from custody but must remain in the country under judicial supervision, with his bail set at 5 million euros.

His detention has been met with scorn from Russian politicians, with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov saying the incident had brought France-Russia relations to their lowest-ever level, and Zakharova saying Durov’s arrest caused “shock throughout the world.”

During a news conference on Wednesday, Zakharova continued her criticism, pointing out what she perceived as hypocrisy from France and “the collective West.”

“When similar actions were taken by other countries … Paris was the first to go into hysterics. And not Paris under Sarkozy or Chirac, but under Macron,” Zakharova said, referencing the reaction to Roskomnadzor’s 2018 banning of Telegram.

Roskomnadzor, the Russian government’s executive agency responsible for media monitoring, banned Telegram after it declined to grant state security services access to private conversations.

“I would like to remind you again that in 2018, the West lined up a whole ‘artillery’ against our country when a Russian court issued a ruling to block Telegram,” Zakharova said. “Dozens of nongovernmental organizations (26 major NGOs) that declared themselves ‘defenders of human rights and freedom of speech,’ published a collective appeal, criticized on a daily basis, and acted as experts with an anti-Russian focus in connection with the fact that, as they said, ‘a hunt has been declared on Telegram.'”

In April 2018, international human rights and media freedom organizations—including Amnesty International, Freedom House and Reporters Without Borders—signed a declaration “strongly condemn[ing] the attempts by the Russian Federation to block the Internet messaging service Telegram, which have resulted in extensive violations of freedom of expression and access to information.”

Zakharova went on to cite comments made by French politician Harlem Désir, an OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, who called Russia’s 2018 decision “deeply worrying” and said Telegram had “become an important channel for the dissemination of information by various media outlets.”

The Foreign Ministry spokesperson argued that the apparent silence of these organizations and figures after Durov’s recent arrest was proof of the West’s double standard concerning free expression and Telegram.

“All this once again demonstrated the true attitude of the French leadership,” Zakharova said, calling on those who criticized Russia’s 2018 ban “to condemn the actions taken by French authorities to restrict [freedom of expression].”

Newsweek has contacted the French Foreign Ministry for comment on Zakharova’s statements.

On X, formerly Twitter, French President Emmanuel Macron denied that Durov’s arrest had any political motivation, adding that the country remained “deeply committed to freedom of expression and communication.”

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