(Paris) The custody in France of the Franco-Russian boss of Telegram, Pavel Durov, arrested for twelve offences relating to organised crime, is due to end on Wednesday and could lead to an indictment, at the risk of provoking further angry reactions around the world.
The French justice system accuses it of not taking action against the dissemination of criminal or offending content on Telegram, which has more than 900 million users. This is something the company denies.
Accompanied by his bodyguard and his assistant, the billionaire founder of the messaging service, aged 39, was arrested on Saturday evening at the Bourget airport terminal in the north of Paris, under a French search warrant, then taken into police custody.
Mr Durov was arriving from Baku and was due to spend at least the evening in Paris, where he had planned to have dinner.
He was arrested as part of a judicial investigation opened against an unknown person on July 8 and led by specialized investigating judges from Paris, after a preliminary inquiry by the cybercrime section of the Paris prosecutor’s office.
Complicity?
It targets in particular the “refusal to communicate information necessary for interceptions authorized by law”, the complicity in offenses and crimes which are organized on the platform (drug trafficking, child pornography, fraud and money laundering by organized gangs) and “the provision of cryptology services aimed at ensuring confidentiality functions without a proper declaration”.
Mr Durov’s custody, which can last up to 96 hours, has been extended until Wednesday. The investigating judges will then have to decide whether to request that he be brought before the Paris judicial court.
If he were charged and his pre-trial detention requested, a judge of liberties and detention would have to decide at the end of the day whether to incarcerate him or place him under judicial supervision.
Mr Durov may also be released from police custody without prosecution at this stage.
Paper airplanes
The arrest of Dubai-based Pavel Durov has sparked strong reactions around the world. He has received support from Russian-based American whistleblower Edward Snowden and Elon Musk, the American boss of X.
In Moscow, Deputy Speaker of the Duma, the lower house of parliament, Vladislav Davankov, and members of his liberal New People party placed paper planes in the shape of the Telegram logo in front of the French embassy on Sunday.
“The accusations made are very serious and require equally strong evidence,” Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday, denouncing an “attempt at intimidation.”
French President Emmanuel Macron assured on Monday that the arrest of Pavel Durov was “in no way a political decision” but was “part of a judicial investigation”, adding that France was “committed to freedom of expression and communication”.
The online messaging service that Pavel Durov launched in 2013 with his brother Nikolai, on which communications can be encrypted from end to end and whose headquarters are in Dubai, has positioned itself against the grain of American platforms, criticized for their commercial exploitation of personal data.
Telegram has notably committed to never revealing information about its users.
“Telegram complies with European laws, including the Digital Services Regulation, its moderation action is in line with the industry standard,” Telegram defended itself on its own channel on Sunday evening, considering it “absurd to say that a platform or its boss are responsible for the abuses” noted on said platform.
According to Telegram, Pavel Durov has “dual citizenship of the United Arab Emirates and France,” in addition to Russian citizenship.
The United Arab Emirates announced on Tuesday that it had asked France for consular access to Pavel Durov, saying it was monitoring his situation “closely”.
Mr Durov, who founded Telegram after leaving Russia a decade ago, is worth an estimated $15.5 billion, according to Forbes magazine.