Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov was released from jail on Wednesday but indicted on six charges related to allegedly illegal activity on the social media app and forbidden from leaving France.
PARIS (LifeSiteNews) — Telegram co-founder and CEO Pavel Durov has been released from jail on bail but is forbidden from leaving France and must check in with the French police twice a week.
On Wednesday, August 28, Durov was released on 5 million euros (5,537,620 USD) bail. However, French authorities also indicted Durov on six charges related to allegedly illegal activity on the popular messaging app.
Politico quotes the Paris prosecutor’s office press release, stating that the charges include complicity in managing Telegram “in order to enable an illegal transaction in organized group.”
Durov was reportedly also charged with “complicity in the offenses of making available without legitimate reason a program or data designed for… organized gang distribution of images of minors presenting child pornography, drug trafficking.”
READ: Telegram founder tells Tucker Carlson that US intel agents tried to spy on user messages
Telegram “appears in multiple cases involving various offenses (child sexual abuse offenses, trafficking, online hate),” the prosecutor’s office stated, highlighting “Telegram’s almost total failure to respond to judicial requests.”
“When consulted, other French investigation departments and public prosecutors’ offices, as well as various Eurojust partners, notably Belgian, shared the same observation,” the French prosecutor added. “This led… to opening an investigation into the possible criminal responsibility of the managers of this messaging service.”
A French judge will now investigate these charges further.
The prosecutor also mentioned that a preliminary investigation into Telegram and its co-founder had already been opened in February. Politico reports that arrest warrants for both Telegram co-founder Pavel Durov and his brother Nikolai were issued by French authorities in March.
Durov’s lawyer David-Olivier Kaminski said, “The only statement I’d wish to make is that Telegram is in conformity with every aspect of European norms on digital matters. It is absurd to think that the head of a social network is being charged.”
READ: Arrest of Telegram founder Pavel Durov signals an increasing threat to digital freedom
Durov, who is a Russian, French, and UAE citizen, was arrested on August 24 after his private jet landed at Le Bourget airport. His arrest sparked outrage and concern among prominent free speech advocates such as Elon Musk and Tucker Carlson and has triggered diplomatic tensions between France, Russia, and the UAE, with the latter two offering support to Durov.
French President Emmanuel Macron denied the charges of Durov’s arrest being politically motivated.
“The arrest of the president of Telegram on French soil took place as part of an ongoing judicial investigation,” Macron wrote on X. “It is in no way a political decision. It is up to the judges to rule on the matter.”
However, if one of the main concerns of the prosecution is child sexual abuse and human trafficking allegedly facilitated through Telegram, as it has stated, other social media platforms would need to be charged as well. Reports in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal revealed that social media giant Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, knew about its platforms being used to facilitate child sexual exploitation but neglected to solve the issue. Yet, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has faced no legal consequences.
