Rumble to 'Turn Off France Entirely' After Paris Demands Russian Media Be Blocked

The European Union slapped harsh sanctions on almost all things Russian after Moscow launched its military operation in Ukraine. Russian media has also been subject to restrictions, with Brussels blocking many media outlets, including Sputnik and RT.

Rumble has announced that it is going to disable access to its service in France after Paris demanded that the video hosting platform remove Russian news sources.

"As part of our mission to restore a free and open internet, we have committed not to move the goalposts on our content policies," the company said in a statement. "Users with unpopular views are free to access our platform on the same terms as our millions of other users."

The company also said it challenges the legality of the French government's demands, pledging that the decision to turn off France "will not have a material effect on our business, as France represents less than one percent of our users."

"The French people, however, will lose access to a wide range of Rumble content because of these government demands. We hope that the French government reconsiders its decision so we can restore access soon," Rumble concluded.

The company's head, Chris Pavlovlsky, drew parallels between himself and the new owner of Twitter, Elon Musk, when commenting on the decision. He underlined that just like the Tesla and SpaceX founder, he will not change his company's policy "for any foreign government."

Earlier, in March, Musk said that Starlink had received demands from "some governments (not Ukraine) to block Russian news sources."

"We will not do so unless at gunpoint. Sorry to be a free speech absolutist," Musk said at the time.

Russian media outlets, Sputnik and RT among them, have been slapped with EU sanctions imposed after the beginning of Moscow's military operation in Ukraine. In early March, the EU banned the broadcasting and distribution of Sputnik and RT content as part of the sanctions, and suspended the relevant licenses.

Moscow blasted the move to sanctions Russian media as "political persecution," with Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova calling it "an irreversible devaluation of European norms and values as well as the decline of the EU justice system."