Russian embassy in Syria back online after Twitter ban

Russia’s embassy in Damascus is back on Twitter, after it had its account temporarily suspended. The reasoning behind the short-lived ban is still unclear.

The embassy celebrated the reinstatement of tweeting rights on Wednesday evening, with staff thanking supporters for raising awareness about the ban. “Stay with us and encourage your friends to join,” the account tweeted, “as further on in such surcumstances (sic) we'll need much stronger backup.”

Earlier, the embassy’s account was abruptly suspended, with Twitter giving no explanation, save for a note that it “suspends accounts which violate the Twitter Rules.” The suspension did, however, come after the embassy posted a video criticizing the controversial ‘White Helmets,’ a Syrian civil-defense organization supposedly linked to jihadist rebels and terror organizations like Al-Qaeda.

Russia’s embassy in South Africa blasted Twitter’s “thought police” for the ban, while the Russian Foreign Ministry called the action “an act of censorship and a flagrant violation of freedom of speech.”

Meanwhile, the US embassy in Damascus still enjoys its verified status and all the blue-checkmark privileges that come with it, despite not occupying a physical building since 2012.

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