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No plans for blocking YouTube, though it deserves this — legislator

Anton Gorelkin explained that YouTube was blocking "any alternative points of view" and spreading fake news and Russophobia", however the platform hosts "a great deal of children's content and popular science videos and other diverse content of great interest to the public at large"

MOSCOW, August 12. /TASS/. There are no plans for blocking the video hosting YouTube, although the platform deserves to be blocked, the deputy chairman of the State Duma’s committee on information policies, Anton Gorelkin (of the United Russia), said on Friday.

"Everything that the [YouTube] platform is doing today already deserves to be blocked under Russian laws, because in fact it participates in the information war against our people. But, according to my sources, there are no immediate plans for blocking YouTube," said Gorelkin, while answering questions from Telegram-channel Dialogue.

He explained that YouTube was blocking "any alternative points of view" and spreading fake news and Russophobia." Alongside this the platform hosts "a great deal of children's content and popular science videos and other diverse content of great interest to the public at large."

"When a strong Russian competitor emerges and we see bloggers actively drift there and transfer their archives, then YouTube can be blocked, just like Instagram (banned in Russia; owned by the Meta corporation, which is recognized as extremist in Russia), if they don’t repent and apologize," Gorelkin believes.

On March 21, a court in Moscow sustained a request from the Prosecutor General's Office to declare the activities of Instagram and Facebook as extremist and prohibited their operation in Russia.