The American group Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, announced on Monday that it is banning the access of official Russian media to its platforms worldwide, in order to avoid any “foreign interference activity”.
The Meta Platform
The ban comes as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday denounced the destabilizing activities of the Russian media station RT, which he said had turned into a “subsidiary” of the Russian secret services around the world.
“After a careful analysis, we expanded our action against the official Russian media”Meta said in response to a request from AFP.
“Rossia Segodnia, RT and other related entities are now banned from our applications worldwide due to their external interference activities,” the American company said, writes Agerpres.
About ten days ago, US authorities unveiled a series of measures, including criminal proceedings and sanctions, targeting Russian media in particular, in response to attempts to interfere in the US election, which they blame on Russia .
The American State Department then imposed visa-related restrictions on the media group of which RT is a part, Rossia Segodnia, as well as other subsidiaries of this company.
In a message posted on Telegram, the spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, made ironic statements regarding the latest American announcements on Friday, saying: “I think there should be a new profession in the United States: specialist in sanctions against Russia.”
The Russian group RT, launched in 2005, is considered by the West as a propaganda organ in favor of the Kremlin.
Its website and television channels broadcast in several languages, including English, Spanish, French, German and Arabic.
