Meta Bans Taliban-Related Social Accounts Including RTA

Meta, formerly known as Facebook banned Taliban-related content and pages on various platforms, including the National Radio and Television of Afghanistan, and Bakhtar News Agency on Wednesday.

The Taliban-related pages got banned by Meta after the tech company stated that the Taliban is a sanctioned terrorist organization under the US law, and therefore, they are banned to use meta-related services under the ‘Dangerous Organizations Policies’. Meta’s spokesperson stated, “this means we remove accounts maintained by or on behalf of the Taliban and prohibit praise, support, and representation of them.”

This decision comes after thorough monitoring of Taliban-related content, and verifying that Taliban-related pages were engaged in implicit and explicitly harmful content, including calls for violence and beheading, support for terrorists, glorification of terrorist activities, denial of human rights, justification of repressive policies against women and other harmful acts and contents.

Meta, reportedly, has worked with a number of experts in monitoring the aforementioned pages, and the experts have stated that, “the harm posed by the content posted on these accounts did not outweigh the news reporting elements of these pages, and at a time when independent news outlets have been banned from reporting in Afghanistan, these former media pages have served as amplified sources of harmful propaganda.”

The decision of banning Taliban- related content has been highly welcomed by the Afghan public, and many has started asking Twitter to take the same action. Many Afghans and internationals around the globe have started a new trend, #BanTaliban.

Meta maintained that the company takes into account that the Afghan public heavily rely on Meta’s services to stay in contact with loved ones and family members, and hence, by working with local, national, and international experts, the company will strive to ensure that ground realities from a human rights, safety, and public interest are taken into account.

The company also stated, “our hearts go out to the people of Afghanistan and the ongoing humanitarian crisis in the country. Till date, Meta has donated over $4 million to safety and humanitarian relief efforts in the country, including donations to IMC, Emergency NGOs, and UNICEF in response to the recent earthquake.”