French government has slammed Telegram founder Parel Durov after latter accused French intelligence services of having asked him through an intermediary to censor some Moldovan voices. In a long post on Twitter, Telegram founder claimed that the French agency made the request around one year ago asking him to help the Moldovan government censor certain Telegram channels ahead of the presidential elections in Moldova. He added that he refused the request as the same “was unacceptable on several levels.”In response, the French foreign ministry wrote in a post on Twitter that Durov had made similar accusations about France trying to manipulate politics in Romania earlier this year. “After Romania, Moldova. @durov likes making accusations while elections are ongoing,” said the post from French foreign ministry.Moldovans were voting in a parliamentary election on Sunday, June 28, that could have a major impact on the government’s quest to join the European Union. The elections took place at a time when pro-Russian opposition group is reportedly seeking to steer the nation away from closer ties with the bloc.

Incidentally, this is not the first time that Durov has accused French government. In May 2025, Durov said that the head of France’s foreign intelligence agency had asked him to ban Romanian conservative voices ahead of elections there. France’s DGSE, the foreign intelligence service, denied that at the time.Durov was arrested in August 2024 at a French airport and is under judicial supervision in France while being investigated for suspected organised crime on the Telegram app.

Telegram founder’s full Twitter post that has angered France

About a year ago, while I was stuck in Paris, the French intelligence services reached out to me through an intermediary, asking me to help the Moldovan government censor certain Telegram channels ahead of the presidential elections in Moldova. After reviewing the channels flagged by French (and Moldovan) authorities, we identified a few that clearly violated our rules and removed them. The intermediary then informed me that, in exchange for this cooperation, French intelligence would “say good things” about me to the judge who had ordered my arrest in August last year.This was unacceptable on several levels. If the agency did in fact approach the judge — it constituted an attempt to interfere in the judicial process. If it did not, and merely claimed to have done so, then it was exploiting my legal situation in France to influence political developments in Eastern Europe — a pattern we have also observed in Romania 🇷🇴Shortly thereafter, the Telegram team received a second list of so-called “problematic” Moldovan channels. Unlike the first, nearly all of these channels were legitimate and fully compliant with our rules. Their only commonality was that they voiced political positions disliked by the French and Moldovan governments. We refused to act on this request. Telegram is committed to freedom of speech and will not remove content for political reasons. I will continue to expose every attempt to pressure Telegram into censoring our platform. Stay tuned.