When Belarus or other non-Western states take steps similar to what France did in arresting Telegram CEO Pavel Durov they are often accused of violating human rights, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko pointed out on Tuesday.
Speaking at a national education summit, Lukashenko said that the French authorities were not wrong in arresting the entrepreneur if they have legitimate concerns over the legality of his activities, but he used the case as an example of Western hypocrisy.
Durov was detained in France last weekend as part of a broader cybercrime probe into his end-to-end encrypted social media platform. On Monday, France revealed a list of preliminary charges, accusing him of “facilitating” alleged illicit activities on his platform, including drug dealing, money laundering, and child pornography, by refusing to cooperate with French investigators.
“We saw how France… and I do not blame them – they are doing the right thing. Durov or not Durov, if you are guilty, you should be made to answer,” the Belarusian leader stated. Directing his words to Western nations, he asked, “why should you make claims against us [Belarus] when we defend ourselves using the same methods as you do?”
Many in the West have called Lukashenko a dictator and criticized his policies, especially with regard to political prisoners. In his speech, he recalled that French President Emmanuel Macron denounced him after the 2020 election in Belarus, which ended with the arrests of several opposition politicians. He noted that Macron’s criticism came at a time when France was dealing with the Yellow Vests protest movement and their standoffs with the authorities.
“Remember, they were killing there, not looking at whether a woman or a man was in front of them… And [Macron] says, but we have democracy, we can do this. And [Lukashenko] has a dictatorship there.
“So, you know, democracy is when you can throw a woman’s head against the wall… strangle a black person, and nothing will happen. And today, Durov was arrested. That is why I want you to feel this, the essence of Western democracy, and make our schoolchildren feel it, too,” Lukashenko stated, addressing the assembly.
Macron has claimed that Durov’s arrest was part of “an ongoing judicial investigation” and was “in no way a political decision.” However, numerous opinion leaders, both in the West and Russia, have slammed France’s actions as a crackdown on free speech, with some suggesting that the US was behind the arrest.
Telegram has denied any wrongdoing, calling it “absurd” that a platform or its owner should be made responsible for users that abuse the platform.