Macron on Telegram CEO's Arrest: French Government Was Not Involved (politico.eu) 85
President Emmanuel Macron said Monday that the French government was not involved in the arrest of Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov. From a report: "The arrest of Telegram's president on French territory took place as part of an ongoing judicial investigation. This is in no way a political decision. It is up to the judges to decide," Macron said. Durov was detained Saturday night after his private jet arrived in Paris. The Paris prosecutor has not yet communicated the reasons for the arrest of Durov, who founded the messaging app in 2013.
The tech chief currently remains in policy custody. The arrest follows probes "accusing Telegram of being complicit in numerous affairs linked to drug trafficking, apology for terrorism and cyberbullying," French daily Le Monde reported. In a statement, Telegram said that its CEO -- a Russian-born French-Emirati citizen -- had "nothing to hide" and that the company abided by EU law.
[...] "More than anything else, France is committed to freedom of expression and communication, innovation and entrepreneurship," Macron said Monday. "In a state governed by the rule of law, on social networks as in real life, freedoms are exercised within a framework established by law to protect citizens and respect their fundamental rights."
The tech chief currently remains in policy custody. The arrest follows probes "accusing Telegram of being complicit in numerous affairs linked to drug trafficking, apology for terrorism and cyberbullying," French daily Le Monde reported. In a statement, Telegram said that its CEO -- a Russian-born French-Emirati citizen -- had "nothing to hide" and that the company abided by EU law.
[...] "More than anything else, France is committed to freedom of expression and communication, innovation and entrepreneurship," Macron said Monday. "In a state governed by the rule of law, on social networks as in real life, freedoms are exercised within a framework established by law to protect citizens and respect their fundamental rights."
Non-government arrests? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:1)
"Hey, it wasn't *our* police. Just some guys with badges, damned if we know who they were."
Re: Non-government arrests? (Score:1)
Re: Non-government arrests? (Score:2)
It's almost as if this telegram CEO guy failed to wear a bikini on a French beach...
Re: (Score:2)
An arrest on the behest of a French government of a French national on French soil doesn't tend to go down that well, particularly in France, which is why Macron is making the effort to say this one had no political motivation.
Re: (Score:1)
i know it's downright cliche to say today but this is weird, this is a weird response to have to this story.
Re: Non-government arrests? (Score:2)
Weird is the least of our worries. Anyone still on the trump train is mentally ill at best. Dangerous psychopath at worst.
Re: (Score:1)
Farley was doing a skit as Newt Gingrich, and at one point tried to pass a bill that "Would refer to all Democrats, going forward, as weird".
I realized that the DNC had cribbed a Chris Farley skit circa 1994 for their current media campaign
Re: Non-government arrests? (Score:2)
Imagine referencing a 30 year old skit and thinking you aren't actually the out of touch Principle Skinner meme. Go to the nursing home grandpa.
Re: (Score:2)
Also to frame this is bad as though Chris Farley is considered unfunny and unloved by generations of people.
"Ahh you based your media on wildly popular and beloved figures and ideas, what a bad move"
Re: (Score:1)
Say what? When did this happen? Why would this matter? Considering the Catholic Church is the largest pedophile ring on the planet, they deserve to be ridiculed.
where biological males could freely beat women up in Olympic boxing?
Huh. And here I've been told that if you're born with a vagina you're a woman. I guess we've been told wrong.
Re: (Score:2)
France is a democracy and they have separation of powers, the guy wasn't arrested by the government (executive power) but by the justice system. Prosecutors and judges are not subordinates of the president.
Re:Non-government arrests? (Score:5, Informative)
That was a bit of editorializing on Politico, the Tweet/response from Macron does not actually use the word "government" anywhere. Macron is simply stating that there was no political involvement in the arrest, that it was handled by the judiciary and investigators.
Je lis ici de fausses informations concernant la France suite à l’arrestation de Pavel Durov.
La France est plus que tout attachée à la liberté d’expression et de communication, à l’innovation et à l’esprit d’entreprise. Elle le restera.
Dans un État de droit, sur les réseaux sociaux comme dans la vie réelle, les libertés sont exercées dans un cadre établi par la loi pour protéger les citoyens et respecter leurs droits fondamentaux.
C’est à la justice, en totale indépendance, qu’il revient de faire respecter la loi.
L’arrestation du président de Telegram sur le territoire français a eu lieu dans le cadre d’une enquête judiciaire en cours. Ce n’est en rien une décision politique. Il revient aux juges de statuer.
Translated from French by Google
I read false information here regarding France following the arrest of Pavel Durov.
France is more than anything attached to freedom of expression and communication, to innovation and to the spirit of enterprise. It will remain so.
In a state governed by the rule of law, on social networks as in real life, freedoms are exercised within a framework established by law to protect citizens and respect their fundamental rights.
It is up to the justice system, in complete independence, to ensure that the law is respected.
The arrest of the Telegram president on French territory took place as part of an ongoing judicial investigation. This is in no way a political decision. It is up to the judges to decide.
https://x.com/EmmanuelMacron/s... [x.com]
Re:Non-government arrests? (Score:5, Informative)
French law apparently from what I read is they can hold him for a maximum of 96 hours with a judges approval, then they have to charge or release. Seems pretty standard legal stuff. Why don't we just wait and see before rampant speculation.
I am vaguely aware France is a guilty till proven innocent country,
And you'd be entirely wrong, not just vaguely, France has had presumed innocence since the 18th century at least.
In France69 the presumption of innocence has been given a fundamental value by the introduction to the Constitution dating back to 1958, which solemnly proclaims faithfulness to the human rights set out into the Declaration issued in 1789.70 Art. 9 of the latter, which is a manifesto of the Enlightenment principles, expressly mentions the principle, even if in a sense that is more referrable to the treatment reserved to the defendant.71 The principlein a global sense, and with reference also to the corollary in dubio pro reohas been established again in the ordinary legislation, by including it, in 2000, into the preliminary art. 304, of the Code of Penal Procedure.72
The presumption of innocence in France has been strongly associated with its function of evidential rule,from which also the rule affirmanti incumbit probatio and the identification of the party on which the risk of the failed proof or of doubt falls back, that is the public prosecutor or the plaintiff (partie poursuivante).73 It is the prosecuting party, which provides for the proof of the criminal offence made, in order to “établir tous les éléments constitutifs de l’infraction et l’absence de tous les éléments susceptibles de la fa ire disparaître”.
https://www.scirp.org/journal/... [scirp.org]
I foresee a lot of startups exiting France and moving to Switzerland
They are free to do that then. Switzerlands got it's own issues...
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, but that's not the whole story. For various historical reasons, France has multiple, sometimes overlapping, legal systems for both their civil and legal courts. They may have technically added at some point the presumption of innocence without proof beyond doubt. But they did not shoot the elephant in the room. One of their criminal court systems... the one you *really* don't want involved in your case... is one that is descended from, and they have retained since, the inquisition. Yes... THAT inq
Re: (Score:2)
So what you are saying in a long winded way is France does in fact have a presumption of innocence but the way they structure their legal system is different than say, the USA Ok?
What about this case do we know where we can say France is being unfair or unjust? If he didn't want to be subject to the French legal system why did he break the law in France and why did he become a French citizen?
Re: (Score:2)
No, not okay. And yes, unjust. An on-paper "presumption of innocence" is worth about as much as a bucket of warm spit when the goddamned JUDGE is actively colluding with police and prosecutors against the accused to railroad the latter into prison.
As to the why, perhaps his case qualifies for one of France's real courts, not the inquisitorial one. The article I read was not 100% clear as to exactly which charges get a trial and which ones get the inquisition. But I would maintain that the fact that the
Re: (Score:2)
Again, you've taken differences in a legal system and seemingly without really understanding it decided that "this system just, this system unjust" and of course as i start to do the barest amount of research I already find facts that run completely counter to your narrative.
Despite high media attention and frequent portrayals in TV series, examining judges are active in a small minority of cases. In 2005, there were 1.1 million criminal rulings in France, while only 33,000 new cases were investigated by ju
Re: (Score:2)
how in the name of almighty Cthulhu's butthole do you imagine a judiciary can remain neutral, objective, and impartial when it's engaged in those shenanigans?!?!?
The same way you trust a judge in the US, same judge who often in civil cases actual makes the judgements, same way in criminal cases they can drive much of how a trial operates, same way you trust any part of the legal system, which it seems you don't so why do you care. Do you trust the US judicial system? Why?
This is the classic you point things out and vaguely allude to something "bad" and never actuall declare it. "It's an old style! Middle ages!" doesnt actually say anything. You just assume they b
Re: Non-government arrests? (Score:2)
French law apparently from what I read is they can hold him for a maximum of 96 hours with a judges approval, then they have to charge or release. Seems pretty standard legal stuff. Why don't we just wait and see before rampant speculation.
How about if the government doesn't want speculation on the nefariousness of their motives they can simply state what those motives are upfront?
In no way is that 4-days they have alotted themselves somehow an agreement I have entered into to give them the benefit of the doubt over that full period before commenting.
It serves the purpose of an absolute maximum for the government to deal with sorting out edge cases (e.g. someone roughtly matches the profile and location of a recent violent crime perpetrator b
Re: (Score:2)
How about if the government doesn't want speculation on the nefariousness of their motives they can simply state what those motives are upfront?
I never stated what the government "wants", just what i thought might be prudent (get information before running mouths), nothing more. The speculation has done nothing to further what we actually know and all we have gotten is bad legal theory about France. Great job.
In no way is that 4-days they have alotted themselves somehow an agreement I have entered into to give them the benefit of the doubt over that full period before commenting.
Sure but who gives a shit what you think is the question and in many cases "no information" is far far better than "limited and speculative information which is usually bad". Nobody is saying you have to not say anything but anything you do
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
France used to be thought of as a developed country
Slashdot used to be thought of as a place where intelligent people gathered. But as you demonstrated it's now a place of brainless conjecture.
Re: (Score:2)
That was a bit of editorializing on Politico, the Tweet/response from Macron does not actually use the word "government" anywhere. Macron is simply stating that there was no political involvement in the arrest, that it was handled by the judiciary and investigators.
Exactly. The word "Government" is too non-specific in English. France has the classical 3-tier system and all Macron is saying that this was a decision by the legal tier, no political involvement.
Re: (Score:2)
The problem here is ignorance of the additional meanings of the word within the US, where we generally use it to refer to The State.
Re: (Score:2)
I am not criticizing the word, I am criticizing the translation that selected it.
Re: (Score:1, Insightful)
Ya know... If I am being held in a prison in some country, I'd feel pretty strongly that the government was somehow involved.
Re:Non-government arrests? (Score:4)
Can we stop pretending we don't recognize a simple translation fail, which most likely sounds like "the executive branch was not involved, it was a decision of the judiciary" or some such in the original French?
Re: (Score:3)
Their judicial system is independent of the political branch of Government.
You need to understand what the word "Government" means from a parliamentary standpoint.
Re: (Score:2)
In common English parlance all those words can mean the same thing and slightly different things, depending on the context they are used in.
Re: (Score:3)
I agree, that would be State (L'État).
Re: (Score:2)
Macron was not trying to imply that the French State was not involved, merely not his Government, which is a little more than an administration in the way you're using that word, but they're analogous enough.
Re: (Score:2)
In reality, the word govern/government originates as a term for just those that govern- not the courts.
Re: (Score:3)
OP is blatant misinformation. At no point did Macron state that this wasn't a government arrest.
What he actually said is that the arrest was non-political. It was conducted by judiciary branch, with no involvement of politicians.
He likely means his administration didn't do it (Score:2, Flamebait)
The lines in the United States have blurred due to court packing by our conservative party, but I don't think France is as far along as we are.
Yes, that's what they're claiming. And it's true. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
They are claiming that they have working division of power. And they do.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
So do mine. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
My God can beat up your God!
Re: (Score:2)
This proves it's political (Score:1)
He didn't cite the law, he didn't explain the legal process that took place, he just came out and in Krusty the Clown style said "Don't blame me, I didn't do it!"
Well yeah... maybe you didn't order the arrest. But you can certainly FREE HIM... and you didn't... further confirming this is political.
Re:This proves it's political (Score:5, Insightful)
France, like the United States, has an independent judiciary.
Suddenly division of powers is something people on here don't understand?
Re: (Score:3)
To be fair, it's still a completely different system from Common Law one. In Common Law, you have independent judiciary from point of view of the court system itself. Prosecutor is adversary to the accused, then there's a defender that is defending the accused, and judge is merely ensuring that system works as an impartial arbiter.
In French system, judge is also a prosecutor, and often also a defender. He is tasked with investigating the entirety of circumstances related to the case, meaning he also perform
Re: (Score:2)
To be fair, it's still a completely different system from [the] Common Law one. In Common Law, you have independent judiciary from [the] point of view of the court system itself. [The] Prosecutor is adversary to the accused, then there's a defender that is defending the accused, and [the] judge is merely ensuring that [the] system works as an impartial arbiter.
So far, so good...
In [the] French system, [the] judge is also a prosecutor, and often also a defender. He is tasked with investigating the entirety of circumstances related to the case, meaning he also performs [a] large portion of jobs of [the] prosecutor and defender in [the] Common Law system.
Well said...
These two just don't map up against one another well, because they're built on mitigating completely different things in judiciary procedings, [sic] and have completely different strong and weak points. The only shared point is that they are nominally independent of [the] political system. However [the] French system is significantly weaker than [the] Common Law one in this aspect by design. Where in Common Law you must effectively subvert both prosecutor and judge to subvert the system (see Trump's New York trial where this happened and how difficult it was to get this all to come together in terms of complexity without getting the case just thrown out immediately in upper courts on appeal), in [the] French system you merely need to subvert the magistrate presiding . French political elites routinely use this feature of the system to get out of trouble, and it's generally considered a weak point of [the] French judicial system on [an] international level.
Ah, I see what you did there, using weasel-wording to imply that the Donald J. Trump felony convictions were a result of misconduct on the part of both judge and prosecutor. While you could legitimately call out the prosecutor for being biased (he did, after all, make "getting Trump" a campaign focus [politifact.com] without actually saying that was his agenda), lumping the judge into that accusation without following up with actual evidence smacks of... Naked partisan-motivated propaganda. S
Re: (Score:2)
Not misconduct. Subversion of the system as a whole. The point is that this level of subversion is much easier in French system compared to English one.
In French, you just need the magistrate to investigate and then interpret things in desired way, and that's enough for conviction.
In English, you needed legislative to do a specific targeted law that would expire immediately after this trial (as literally everyone is guilty of this in NYC, "it's not lying, it's commercial real estate" TM Louis Rossmann's hil
Re: (Score:2)
You understand there's a difference between the judiciary which, y'know, JUDGES the crimes and the police and prosecutors who do the arresting which are directly under control of the executive branch?
And I'll reiterate again - Macron can order him freed NOW.
Re: (Score:3)
Macron can order him freed NOW.
No, this is not within the limits of the powers of the President of France. Maybe the minister of the Interior or of the Justice can, but not Macron. What a President can do is to grant a full pardon, but that first requires a sentencing.
Re:This proves it's political (Score:4, Informative)
You understand there's a difference between the judiciary which, y'know, JUDGES the crimes and the police and prosecutors who do the arresting which are directly under control of the executive branch?
France is not America. Neither the police nor the prosecution service is under control of the executive branch.
Re: (Score:2)
The police are in fact under the control of the executive branch (though not Macron, being head of State, not head of Government)
Where it gets weird, is that they're also under the control of the judiciary- they share that power.
I guess it gets even a bit weirder too, since the police are actually under the control of the Ministry of the Interior (on the government sde), which is a person of course selected by the Prime Minister (but actually appointed by the President)
I'm not sure if
Re: (Score:2)
Bullshit.
Re: (Score:2)
Criminal Enquiries in France are under the control of the Judiciary, which is statutorily protected from the executive.
Further, Macron is the head of state, not the executive. The Prime Minister is the head executive of the French Government.
So let's summarize:
Literally everything you said is wrong.
Re: (Score:1)
The prosecution portion of USA justice is not independent, as the DOJ is under the executive branch. This should change, in my opinion. Make it a 4th branch, or maybe move it under the Judicial branch.
Re: (Score:2)
This debate really comes down to a similar situation as Parliamentary Tradition in commonwealth countries.
Sure, the Queen can dissolve parliament.... technically. But if the Queen does so without the consent of parliament... well, they'll just vote out the Queen.
Technically, a President can take active control over the DOJ. However, if they do, it's going to be outright chaos, and the few attempts of doing so i
Re: (Score:1)
> a President can take active control over the DOJ. However, if they do, it's going to be outright chaos
There is a certain tinted candidate who loves chaos and disrespects institutional traditions. May be more down the road (cough MTG cough).
Re: (Score:2)
Trump is a wild card there. The only real earnest attempt to bring the DOJ under direct executive control led to the Saturday Night Massacre, which directly led to articles of impeachment being passed against Nixon.
Of course, it's another argument whether or not impeachment is even possible in today's political climate, so the nominal independence may really be gone... but still, it is at least nominally independent, and when the system is operating correctly, it de facto is.
Re: This proves it's political (Score:2)
Suddenly division of powers is something people on here don't understand?
If the judiciary arresting people for unspecified reasons is considered "separation of powers" then yeah some people here don't know what that's supposed to mean.
Re: (Score:2)
That is a division of powers, even if it's not the way you demand it be.
Re: (Score:2)
In the US, the police force is also independent of both the judiciary and the executive branch. Judges can't arrest people.
Re:This proves it's political (Score:4, Informative)
He didn't cite the law, he didn't explain the legal process that took place, he just came out and in Krusty the Clown style said "Don't blame me, I didn't do it!"
Which is exactly correct. He stated that the executive branch of the government was not involved. France has division of power and there are very few situations or none where the political tier can order an arrest (not sure about the exact details in France). France is not some 3rd world banana republic.
Re: (Score:2)
This isn't to take away from your point that France isn't a banana republic- just that the political arm of government is also empowered with police power.
Primary Source (Score:4, Informative)
C'mon, did we run out of space on the Internet?
https://x.com/EmmanuelMacron/s... [x.com]
People are bickering here because of the editorializing of the secondary fake-news source. It:s all so unnecessary.
This is the New Plan (Score:1)
Governments will lie right to your face, and when they see your outrage, they will bump into you and jut out their chins.
This isn't limited to France, by the way.
Just to ask - has it occurred to anyone? (Score:2, Interesting)
France is a sovereign nation enforcing its laws within its borders. Incidentally, it's generally understood that France is not governed by an authoritarian regime. That means they don't use the law to enforce political agendas. I may not agree with the way that the French judicial system is set up; then again, I'm not entirely on board with the way we do it here in the US.
You'd think that folks who espouse a deep and abiding desire for Law and Order would applaud the way the French are handling this, bu
Eventual Abolition of Messaging Boards (Score:2)
It sounds like owning a communications board is getting too dangerous. Will they all fall with everyone involved in prison, eventually, or else totally useless after everything that annoys some government somewhere results in that government throwing everyone involved into prison if they don't delete virtually everything that doesn't simply talk about the weather?
Maybe alternative is going back to entities like Yahoogroups was, where, yeah, it's on disk and can be seen on the web, and yeah, you can make th
Press release including the accusation act (Score:5, Informative)
https://www.tribunal-de-paris.... [justice.fr]
(My translation)
Founder and leader of a instant messaging platform TELEGRAM, Pavel DUROV was detained and placed under custody Saturday 24th of August 2024, at 20:00 hours, in Bourget.
This is the result from a judiciary investigation opened on the 8th July 2024, following a preliminary investigation lead by section J3 (repression of cyber-criminality -- JULACO) of the Paris Prosecution Office.
This judiciary investigation was opened against an unknown person for the following infractions:
* Accessory -- administration of an online platform allowing illicit transaction, performed in an organized gang
* Refusal to communication, upon request of the relevant authorities, information or documents necessary to realise wiretapping permitted by law
* Accessory -- ownership of images of underage pornography
* Accessory -- diffusion, offer or provisioning, in an organized gang, of images of underage pornography
* Accessory -- Acquisition, transport, ownership, offer or transaction of illicit drugs
* Accessory -- Offer, transaction or provisioning without legitimate reason of equipment, instruments or programs or data designed or adapted to affect or permit access to the functioning of an automated data processing system
* Accessory -- scam in an organized gang
* Conspiration in order to commit a felony or misdemeanour punished by a minimum of 5 years of jail
* Laundering of felonies or misdemeanours, in an organized gang
* Provisioning of cryptology services with objective of confidentiality without previous declaration
* Provisioning of a cryptology method that does not exclusively permit authentication or integrity control, without previous declaration
* Import of a cryptology method that does not exclusively permit authentication or integrity control, without previous declaration
The Investigative Magistrates in charge of this judiciary investigation have together brought the case before the Center of Digital Criminalities (C3N) and the Anti-Fraud office (ONAF) to continue the investigations.
It is within this framework that Pavel DUROV was heard by the investigators.
The hearing was extended on the 25th August 2024 by an Investigative Magistrate and can last 96 hours (meaning until the 28th August 2024) in the reason of complexity of the procedure applicable to infractions pertaining to organized criminalities, as cited above.
Laure BECCUAU
Public prosecutor
Re: (Score:2)
All the accusations seem very generic (they could apply to facebook, whatssap, or any other social media app without *direct control* from a government) but the last one intrigues me.
What do they exactly mean by "[...] cryptology method that does not exclusively permit authentication or integrity control, [...]" ?
Because the cynical in me believes it's all related to the last accusation: a non-broken encryption method.
Politician tells porkies .. (Score:2, Informative)
The arrest of Durov took place as part of an ongoing plot to shut-down legitimate online discourse.
“This is in no way a political decision”
This is in every-way a political decision.