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Saudi calls to boycott TikTok mount as platform denies discrimination

This year, TikTok reported having 26 million active users in Saudi Arabia, positioning it as the second most popular social platform after YouTube. (AFP/File)
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Updated 03 December 2023
Arab News
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Saudi calls to boycott TikTok mount as platform denies discrimination

  • Campaign follows reports of alleged censorship of Saudi content
  • Google Trends shows 25% decline for TikTok since last month
  • Short-form video giant labels boycott campaign a ‘smear act’
Updated 03 December 2023
Arab News

LONDON: Calls to boycott TikTok in Saudi Arabia have intensified since the launch of a campaign accusing the video platform of unjustly censoring and banning Saudi accounts expressing positive views about the Kingdom.

The momentum behind the boycott has grown as concerns over TikTok’s alleged algorithm manipulation and biased treatment continue to provoke outrage among the platform’s Saudi user base.

Many users have turned to alternative social platforms to denounce TikTok’s alleged restricting of pro-Saudi content, with the trending hashtag #BoycottTiktok accompanied by posts urging Saudis to delete the app.

One X user, @ayedarini, urged others to boycott the app, claiming the platform is engaging in a “war against us.”

The user added: “It has become clear that it is targeting Saudi accounts and promoting everything against them and their country. Boycotting it has become a duty for every Saudi.”

 

A recent post by @X_Tiktok_, a dedicated profile advocating for the platform’s ban in the Kingdom, expressed strong disapproval of TikTok’s “unacceptable” and “abusive” behavior, pledging to persist in its campaign against the platform.

“TikTok still continues its malicious bias with its violating policies on Saudi users’ posts, especially national clips,” the post said. “Saudi Arabia remains a red line and the Saudi people remain strong and strict in their defense of their country, religion and leadership.”

 

Influential social media personalities and celebrities have lent their support to the campaign, leveraging their substantial followings to amplify the message and motivate others to join the boycott. The Saudi private sector has also responded to the boycott’s impact.

Citing a source close to the Saudi First Division League earlier in November, Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper reported that the the second tier of professional football in Saudi Arabia had cut off its relationship with TikTok due to the platform’s alleged actions against Saudi content.

Popular social media news channel The Saudi Post announced on Thursday the cessation of its publications and the closure of all its accounts on the platform.

TikTok issued a statement on Wednesday, denying allegations of restricting Saudi content and dismissing the campaign as a “coordinated action.”

The app said in a statement: “The rumors regarding TikTok removing content related to Saudi Arabia are not true. We strongly reject these allegations that are inconsistent with our policies and values.

“We strongly reject the deliberate smear campaigns that are practiced on our employees and partners and threaten their security and safety.”

 

Political analyst and media personality Salman Al-Ansari commented on the boycott, saying that the platform’s statement lacked any “commitment to corrective measures,” which would only escalate the campaign.

This year, TikTok reported having 26 million active users in Saudi Arabia, positioning it as the second most popular social platform after YouTube.

Data indicates that the boycott has resulted in a decline in the number of Saudi TikTok users. According to Google Trends, the popularity of the term “TikTok” has decreased by 25 percent since the campaign began.

In an effort to rebuild trust, TikTok launched a dedicated hashtag page for Saudi content on its platform.

Despite these measures, the boycott is gaining momentum, transforming into a symbol of public discontent and a defense of Saudi Arabia.

The campaign’s uncertain impact on TikTok’s user base and the platform’s reputation highlights the growing power of collective action by social media users, an area in which TikTok has faced scrutiny.

In the last few years, TikTok and parent company ByteDance have faced intense criticism for handling sensitive user data, leading to calls for a ban in the US.

In November, congress members, activists and tech investors renewed demands for a TikTok ban, alleging bias in content related to the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Nepal last month announced a full ban of TikTok in the country, saying that the Chinese-owned video-sharing platform was “detrimental to social harmony.”

Topics: TikTok Saudi Arabia Boycott

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Albania bans TikTok for a year after killing of teenager

Updated 22 December 2024
Reuters
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Albania bans TikTok for a year after killing of teenager

  • Prime Minister Edi Rama government’s decision comes after a 14-year-old schoolboy was stabbed to death in November by a fellow pupil
Updated 22 December 2024
Reuters

TIRANA: Albania on Saturday announced a one-year ban on TikTok, the popular short video app, following the killing of a teenager last month that raised fears over the influence of social media on children.
The ban, part of a broader plan to make schools safer, will come into effect early next year, Prime Minister Edi Rama said after meeting with parents’ groups and teachers from across the country.
“For one year, we’ll be completely shutting it down for everyone. There will be no TikTok in Albania,” Rama said.
Several European countries including France, Germany and Belgium have enforced restrictions on social media use for children. In one of the world’s toughest regulations targeting Big Tech, Australia approved in November a complete social media ban for children under 16.
Rama has blamed social media, and TikTok in particular, for fueling violence among youth in and outside school.
His government’s decision comes after a 14-year-old schoolboy was stabbed to death in November by a fellow pupil. Local media had reported that the incident followed arguments between the two boys on social media. Videos had also emerged on TikTok of minors supporting the killing.
“The problem today is not our children, the problem today is us, the problem today is our society, the problem today is TikTok and all the others that are taking our children hostage,” Rama said.
TikTok said it was seeking “urgent clarity” from the Albanian government.
“We found no evidence that the perpetrator or victim had TikTok accounts, and multiple reports have in fact confirmed videos leading up to this incident were being posted on another platform, not TikTok,” a company spokesperson said.

 

Topics: TikTok Albania

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Suspect in German Christmas market attack was ‘not quite what many rushed to assume’, veteran British journalist says
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Syrian Al-Jazeera presenter returns to post-Assad Hama after 12 years in exile

Suspect in German Christmas market attack was ‘not quite what many rushed to assume’, veteran British journalist says

Updated 21 December 2024
Arab News
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Suspect in German Christmas market attack was ‘not quite what many rushed to assume’, veteran British journalist says

  • ‘Evidence from his social media indicates he was an anti-Islam doctor who arrived in Germany in 2006 from Saudi Arabia’
Updated 21 December 2024
Arab News

DUBAI: British journalist Andrew Neil said the attacker behind Friday night’s deadly car-ramming at a busy Christmas market in Magdeburg, Germany appeared to be ‘not quite what many on social media rushed to assume.’

“Evidence from his social media indicates he was an anti-Islam doctor who arrived in Germany in 2006 from Saudi Arabia,” the veteran journalist posted on his social media account.

The suspect, who was identified by German authorities as 50-year-old Saudi psychologist Taleb Al-Abdulmohsen, who had permanent residency and had lived in Germany for almost two decades. The motive for the car-ramming remained unknown, and a police operation was under way in the town of Bernburg, south of Magdeburg, where the suspect was believed to have lived.

 

 

Reports have noted that Saudi Arabia had warned German authorities about the attacker, who had posted extremist views on his personal X account. Germany’s Der Spiegel said the attacker sympathized with the far-right Alternative for Germany party. The magazine did not say where it got the information.

“Various media reports suggest he helped ex-Muslims, particularly women, to flee Saudi Arabia after turning their backs on Islam,” Neil commented. Neil also noted that the suspect posted tweets in support Elon Musk, jailed far right activist Tommy Robinson and malevolent conspiracy theorist Alex Jones.

“His social media posts also indicate he thought Germany not doing enough to help Saudi female asylum seekers who had rejected Islam – and that the authorities were trying to undermine his work on their behalf,” the British journalist added.

“In his recent social-media posts published days before the attack he claimed the German government was promoting Islamisation and accused authorities of censoring and persecuting him because of his critical views of Islam. On his website, he warned prospective refugees to avoid Germany because of its government’s tolerance of radical Islam,” Neil said.

Christmas markets are a huge part of German culture as an annual holiday tradition, and the violence has prompted other German towns to cancel their weekend events as a precaution and out of solidarity with Magdeburg’s loss.

Berlin kept its markets open but has increased its police presence at them.

Topics: Germany

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Syrian Al-Jazeera presenter returns to post-Assad Hama after 12 years in exile

Updated 21 December 2024
Arab News
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Syrian Al-Jazeera presenter returns to post-Assad Hama after 12 years in exile

  • Fakhouri, a former presenter at the Syrian TV station, fled the country in 2012 after tight censorship
  • He was interrogated by the State Security Department over revolution coverage
Updated 21 December 2024
Arab News

DUBAI: Syrian Al-Jazeera presenter Ahmad Fakhouri received an overwhelming welcome from crowds of hundreds of people as he returned to his hometown Hama after 12 years in exile.

In a video posted on his social media channels, Fakhouri is seen waving at huge crowds who gathered in the streets in a collective moment of celebration after the fall of Bashar Assad’s regime.

“Come to us, Fakhouri,” people cheered and chanted, inviting him to join the celebrations in the video which Fakhouri captioned: “The people of Hama. None but you are my family and my support.”

 

Fakhouri, a former presenter at the Syrian TV station, fled the country in 2012 after tight censorship was placed on the media during the days of the revolution.

During a 2013 interview with Al Jazeera, Fakhouri said he was not allowed to cover the protests, then later was asked to use derogatory terms, such as “terrorists, infiltrators, and enemies of the homeland,” to describe the demonstrators.

“I was naive enough to ask Bouthaina Shaaban (media advisor to the Syrian Presidency) during high-level meetings to allow us to conduct interviews with the opposition, thinking that Syrian television belonged to the people and not to a specific faction,” Fakhouri had told Al Jazeera at the time.

He also reported being under constant surveillance from security and intelligence officers as a presenter.

Rejecting the regime’s policies that insisted on denying the protests, Fakhouri said he refrained from presenting live news, limiting his work to the weekly news bulletin. When he first decided to leave Syria, he discovered he was banned from travelling.

Shortly afterwards, he was summoned for an interrogation at the State Security Department, facing charges of inciting sectarian divisions and cooperating with foreign entities to disrupt public security. He was also accused of receiving money from his expatriate brother “to fund armed terrorists.”

He reported being blindfolded, and hearing “sounds of torture” and insults directed at detainees across from his interrogation room.

When he was released at the request of the media minister, Fakhouri decided to head to Aleppo where he hid for several months before the Free Syrian Army facilitated his escape.

“I do not need to mention why I decided to leave the regime's grip as everyone is aware of Assad’s crimes against the Syrian people,” said Fakhouri, noting that several of his media colleagues were detained over extended periods, including some who were died under torture.

“I can confirm that most of those working in Syrian media are looking for an opportunity to escape like I did.”

Fakhouri begun his journey in the media at the state radio in 2004 before moving to become a presenter in the Syrian TV.  

After he left Syria, he became known for hosting the “Trending” news bulletin at BBC Arabic until he joined Al Jazeera as a presenter and documentary maker in 2022.

Fakhouri was among many Syrian expats who returned to a nation where jubilation took over since Assad’s iron-fisted regime was toppled by a lightning 11-day rebel offensive spearheaded by the Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham group on Dec. 8.

Since the fall of Assad’s five-decade dynastic rule, harrowing accounts of torture and executions of political prisoners, activists, and regime critics in state prisons — most notably the infamous Sednaya — have emerged publicly.

Topics: Fall of Assad Syria Al-Jazeera journalism

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Media group urges release of detained South Sudan journalist

Updated 20 December 2024
AFP
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Media group urges release of detained South Sudan journalist

  • Emmanuel Monychol Akop, editor-in-chief of local The Dawn newspaper, has not been seen since November 28
Updated 20 December 2024
AFP

NAIROBI: South Sudan has detained a leading journalist, an international media organization said Friday as it urged his immediate release.
News of the apparent arrest followed a warning by the United Nations which denounced arbitrary detentions, including those of opposition party members or individuals associated with them.
Emmanuel Monychol Akop, editor-in-chief of local The Dawn newspaper, has not been seen since November 28, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).
The international monitoring group said he had been detained by National Security Services (NSS) agents, citing his colleagues and an individual familiar with his case, who said he had been summoned to the organization’s headquarters in capital Juba.
“South Sudanese authorities must bring editor Emmanuel Monychol Akop before a court, present credible charges or release him unconditionally,” said Angela Quintal, head of CPJ’s Africa program.
She said the NSS had a “reputation for running roughshod over the rights of journalists,” adding that this detention “further tarnishes an already dismal press freedom record.”
Manager at The Dawn newspaper Moses Guot told the CPJ there were worries about Akop’s security.
“They should allow us to see him, at least to know about his health, and that would be a good start,” he said.
Akop was also detained in 2019 following a Facebook post criticizing a minister’s appearance during a diplomatic visit. He was held for a month before being released.
The arrest comes weeks after gunfire broke out at the home of a recently sacked intelligence chief, spooking many in the young country which since independence has grappled with insecurity.
In September South Sudan once again postponed the first elections in the nation’s history, pushing them back another two years.
South Sudan is one of the poorest countries on the planet despite large oil reserves and ranks 177 out of 180 countries on Transparency International’s corruption perceptions index.

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Two journalists killed in north Syria by ‘Turkish drone’

Two journalists killed in north Syria by ‘Turkish drone’

Updated 20 December 2024
AFP
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Two journalists killed in north Syria by ‘Turkish drone’

  • Nazim Dastan, 32, and Cihan Bilgin, 29, were killed near the Tishrin dam east of Alepp
  • The pair worked for Syrian Kurdish media outlets Rojnews and the Anha news agency
Updated 20 December 2024
AFP

BEIRUT: Two journalists from Turkiye’s mainly Kurdish southeast have been killed, reportedly by a Turkish drone, while covering the fighting between an Ankara-backed militia and US-backed Kurdish fighters in Syria, journalists’ groups said Friday.
Nazim Dastan, 32, and Cihan Bilgin, 29, were killed on Thursday near the Tishrin dam east of Aleppo when their car was hit, the Dicle Firat Journalists’ Association said.
“We condemn this attack on our colleagues and demand accountability,” it said.
The pair worked for Syrian Kurdish media outlets Rojnews and the Anha news agency.
The Turkish Journalists Union also condemned the attack, saying they were “allegedly targeted by a Turkish UAV,” the technical name for a drone.
“We condemn the attack. Journalists cannot be subjected to attack while performing a sacred duty. Those responsible must be found and tried,” the union’s branch in the southeastern Kurdish-majority city of Diyarbakir said.
The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said two journalists had been killed in Aleppo province by a “Turkish drone strike.”
The pro-Kurdish Mezopotamya news agency also blamed a Turkish drone.
The Turkish army insists it never targets civilians but only terror groups.
The incident comes amid mounting concerns over a possible Turkish assault on the Kurdish-held Syrian border town of Kobani, also known as Ain Al-Arab.
Ankara is hoping Syria’s new Islamist HTS rulers will take steps to address the issue of Kurdish fighters in the north.
“If they address this issue properly, there would be no reason for us to intervene,” Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said this week.
Turkiye pushed for Assad’s ouster when the Syrian conflict erupted in 2011 with the violent suppression of peaceful protesters.
But after backing various opposition groups, Turkiye more recently shifted its focus to blocking what President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in 2019 dubbed a “terror corridor” in northern Syria, meaning the large area controlled by the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces, which is backed by the US.
A Turkish defense ministry source on Thursday said Ankara would push ahead with its military preparations until Kurdish fighters “disarm,” stressing the ongoing threat along its border with Syria.

Topics: Fall of Assad

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