BERLIN: The German Foreign Office tweeted screenshots on Friday of the accounts of journalists suspended by Twitter, telling the social media platform that suspending their accounts was unacceptable, while a senior government official threatened to leave Twitter.
“Press freedom cannot be switched on and off on a whim,” the ministry wrote on its official Twitter account. “The journalists below can no longer follow us, comment and criticize. We have a problem with that, @Twitter.”
Twitter on Thursday suspended the accounts of several prominent journalists who had posted about its new owner Elon Musk. The German government has said it is reviewing its use of the platform in the light of changes to its moderation policy introduced by the Tesla mogul.
“Arbitrary locking of journalists’ accounts is unacceptable,” added deputy government spokesperson Wolfgang Buechner in another Tweet.
“If this continues, I will leave this platform,” he added, posting a link to the government’s official account on open-source, decentralized rival Mastodon.
Twitter on Thursday suspended the accounts of journalists who cover the social media platform and its new owner Elon Musk, including reporters working for The New York Times, Washington Post, CNN and other publications.
Neither the company nor Musk gave any explanation for why it took down the accounts and made their profiles and past tweets disappear.
The sudden suspension of news reporters followed Musk’s decision Wednesday to permanently ban an account that automatically tracked the flights of his private jet using publicly available data.
Twitter also on Wednesday changed its rules to prohibit the sharing of another person’s current location without their consent.
Several of the reporters suspended Thursday night had been writing about that new policy and Musk’s rationale for imposing it, which involved his allegations about a stalking incident that affected his family on Tuesday night in Los Angeles.
