Facebook and Instagram users in some countries will be allowed to post violent messages pointed at Russians, Russian soldiers and Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to internal emails cited by Reuters.
According to the outlet, it viewed the emails Thursday. The communications call for a temporary change to the hate speech policy at Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram.
Users of the social media platforms in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, and Ukraine will be impacted by the temporary changes, according to one of the emails.
“As a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine we have temporarily made allowances for forms of political expression that would normally violate our rules like violent speech such as ‘death to the Russian invaders.’ We still won’t allow credible calls for violence against Russian civilians,” a Meta spokesperson said in a statement.
However, calls for violence against Putin and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko will be allowed, according to the report.
Russia began an invasion of Ukraine Feb. 24. While Putin has argued that Ukraine is not a separate country from Russia, other countries – including the U.S. – recognize its sovereignty. Unlike many other nearby European countries, Belarus has been criticized for helping Russia to invade Ukraine.
Since the invasion began, there have been military losses on both sides, as well as civilian deaths and injuries in Ukraine. More than 2.5 million refugees have fled the country, according to the United Nations.
“We are issuing a spirit-of-the-policy allowance to allow T1 violent speech that would otherwise be removed under the Hate Speech policy when: (a) targeting Russian soldiers, EXCEPT prisoners of war, or (b) targeting Russians where it's clear that the context is the Russian invasion of Ukraine (e.g., content mentions the invasion, self-defense, etc.),” said an email sent to Meta moderators.
Early on in the invasion, The Intercept reported that Facebook would temporarily allow praise of the right-wing Ukrainian Azov battalion, which it identified as a Neo-Nazi organization.
A Meta spokesperson previously said the company was “for the time being, making a narrow exception for praise of the Azov Regiment strictly in the context of defending Ukraine, or in their role as part of the Ukraine National Guard.”
Although the Meta emails indicate it will allow some calls for death related to the Russian and their allies, the company will censor posts with highly specific information, including “two indicators of credibility, such as the location or method,” according to one email Reuters viewed.
“We are doing this because we have observed that in this specific context, ‘Russian soldiers’ is being used as a proxy for the Russian military. The Hate Speech policy continues to prohibit attacks on Russians,” one email said.
Russia’s embassy in the U.S. “demanded” that authorities put an end to the reported new practices at Meta in a tweet.
According to FOX News, there has also been “intense backlash” to the policy change from figures such as Tablet Magazine’s Noam Blum, Brooke Rogers of The New York Post, Newsweek opinion editor Josh Hammer and The Nation columnist Jeet Heer.
Facebook has been banned in Russia since last week and the country has also cracked down on Twitter – a separate company – since its invasion of Ukraine began.
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