MOSCOW: Facebook-owned Instagram has blocked posts in Russia related to bribery allegations made by the country’s prominent opposition leader against leading figures in a YouTube video.
The move follows a demand by the country’s Internet censor that Instagram restrict access to posts on its platform connected to allegations made by Russian opposition leader Alexey Navally, western reports have said.
Navalny, a fierce rival for Russian President Vladimir Putin, posted a video earlier this month, that allegedly shows the billionaire Oleg Deripaska meeting with Russia’s deputy prime minister Sergei Prikhodko aboard a yacht.
The 25-minute video, which has been watched more than five million times, claims that a bribery has taken place.
Navalny accused Instagram of having given in to an “illegal censorship request.” “Shame on you, @instagram!” he added.
Navalny has been barred from standing against President Putin in next month’s election because of a separate corruption conviction, which he says was politically motivated.
Instagram’s response contrasts with that of Google’s YouTube service, which had been ordered to block several clips before the end of Wednesday, but it has taken no such action.
The issue highlights a key debate about the choices US Internet giants, such as Facebook and Google, have to make in order to operate in certain markets.
Instagram removes posts linked to Putin rival after Moscow’s demand
Instagram removes posts linked to Putin rival after Moscow’s demand
Costa Rica says plot to assassinate president uncovered
- Security services unveiled that a hitman had been paid to assassinate president Rodrigo Chaves
SAN JOSE: Costa Rica’s government on Tuesday said it had uncovered a plot to assassinate President Rodrigo Chaves on the eve of national elections, in which his right-wing party is tipped for victory.
Jorge Torres, head of the Central American nation’s Directorate of Intelligence and National Security, cited a “confidential source” as informing the agency that a hitman had been paid to attack Chaves.
The purported plot comes two weeks before the country holds presidential and parliamentary elections.
Chaves, who is barred by the constitution from seeking a second consecutive term, has backed one of his former ministers, Laura Fernandez, to succeed him.
Opposition groups have warned against what they see as possible interference in the election from the iron-fisted president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele.
Chaves has invited Bukele to Costa Rica on Wednesday to lay the founding stone of a new mega-prison modelled on El Salvador’s brutal Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT).
Thousands of young men are being held without charge in CECOT, as part of Bukele’s war on gang violence.
