Macron caught up in the Durov affair

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Macron caught up in the Durov affair

The arrest in France and indictment with strict judicial supervision of Pavel Durov, boss of the encrypted messaging service Telegram, provokes a global outcry. Macron takes a back seat.

France’s image once again tarnished! The Homeland of Human Rights, the country of Liberty, the beacon of freedom of expression (since 1881), of freedom of correspondence, enshrined in Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, Macron’s France is suddenly relegated to the rank of banana republics with the Durov affair.
Pavel Durov, 39, of French-Russian nationality but resident in Dubai, CEO of the encrypted messaging service Telegram, was arrested last Saturday at Le Bourget airport, held in police custody for 96 hours, indicted on twelve counts (see below the press release from the Paris public prosecutor’s office) and placed under strict judicial supervision with an obligation to report to a police station twice a week. Although he has no domicile in France, he is forbidden to leave the country.

Encryption algorithms

What is he accused of? Officially, of being the administrator of an online platform that enables illicit transactions to be carried out by organized gangs, and therefore of being an accomplishment to the crimes and misdemeanors committed via Telegram. Unofficially, of refusing to communicate the encryption keys for Telegram exchanges that prevent intelligence services, and in particular the CIA, from tracking Russia’s supporters in the conflict with Ukraine, Gaza’s supporters in the Israeli-Palestinian war and other opponents of American policy… And since Durov refuses to give the secret of his encryption algorithms to the French or American authorities, just as he refused to give them to Putin, he is being persecuted by the “justice” systems of these countries.

Judicial terrorism

Clearly, Telegram’s CEO cannot be an accomplishment to the crimes and misdemeanors that could be committed on his platform, as his lawyer, Me David-Olivier Kaminski, points out, for whom these prosecutions are “absurd”.
On the other hand, the Durov case bears witness to a form of judicial terrorism exercised against anyone who opposes the planetary takeover of information circulating on the web. Either by censoring messages directly, or by intimidating the bosses of the tech giants. All have folded, except Elon Musk and Pavel Durov.

France’s murky game

In this sad affair, Emmanuel Macron is playing a rather murky game. Certainly, the President of the Republic fully assumes the fact of having granted French nationality to Pavel Durov in 2018 as an “emeritus foreigner”. Certainly, he met Durov several times, whose head office he wanted Telegram to set up in France. But Durov preferred Dubai and its financial largesse. As for the rest, he knows nothing about Durov’s visit to Paris.
Strange. The Telegram boss told the police officers who came to pick him up at Le Bourget that he was due to dine with the President. He also said that DGSE agents had visited him in Dubai. Would the Telegram boss have secret, very, very disturbing information about this or that prominent man or woman?
How is it possible that Macron didn’t know? Here we have one of the most closely watched individuals in the world by every intelligence service on the planet, whose every move is followed to the millimeter, whose private jet gives his flight plan to the authorities, and who everyone knew was landing in Paris on Saturday August 24. And our President didn’t know!
Wouldn’t the French judicial authorities have informed the resigning Minister of Justice of Durov’s arrest? And wouldn’t Dupont-Moretti have informed the Élysée Palace? And the DGSI, our domestic services, knew nothing about Durov’s arrival and arrest?
No way! The French president is giving the cold shoulder. But it will be hard for him to emerge unscathed from this affair, which certainly doesn’t bode well. Neither for him, nor for France’s image.

press release



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