Ukraine Invasion: Russia Calls Mark Zuckerberg’s Bluff, Makes New Sanction

Russia has shut Instagram services in the country after Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta announced that it will allow Ukrainians to post messages like ‘Death to Russian invaders’.

Recall that Naija News earlier reported that Facebook and Instagram revealed that they would temporarily change their hate speech policy in Ukraine in the wake of Russia’s February 24 invasion.

The social media giant maintained that it would be wrong if they restricted Ukrainians from expressing their frustration at the invading military forces.’

Reacting to Meta’s sanction, Russia sent out an email message from the state communications regulator on Sunday, March 13 to Instagram users announcing that photos and videos from Instagram be moved before it was shut down at midnight, Daily Mail reports

Users were encouraged to switch to Russia’s own ‘competitive internet platforms.’

The shutdown of Instagram comes one week after the country announced it was shutting down Facebook, over a leak from a content moderator, which showed that the social media site was bending its own rules to allow for some calls to violence against Russian invaders in Ukraine. The company later confirmed the leak.