Meta Group Bans Russian State Media from Its Platforms

Meta is taking action. The American group, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, announced on Monday, September 16, that it was banning Russian state media from accessing its platforms worldwide. “Rossia Segodnia, RT and other related entities are now banned from our apps worldwide due to their foreign interference activities”Meta justified.

The decision comes as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday denounced the destabilizing activities of Russian media outlet RT, which he said had been transformed into a “branch” Russian intelligence in the world. In June, Russia had blocked access to 81 European media outlets.

The US authorities had unveiled in early September a battery of measures targeting RT in particular, including criminal prosecutions and sanctions, in response to attempts to interfere in the elections in the United States, which they attribute to Russia. The State Department had then imposed visa restrictions against the media group to which RT belongs, Rossia Segodnia, as well as other subsidiaries of this company.

In a message on Telegram, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova had joked on Friday about the latest American announcements, saying that it “There should be a new profession in the United States: Russia sanctions specialist”The Russian public media outlet RT, launched in 2005, is considered by Westerners to be a pure propaganda organ in favor of the Kremlin.