In a surprising, yet not-so-surprising move Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) and Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) have fallen in with the Russian government’s request to stop the sales of certain content at its App stores.
This was confirmed by Roskomnadzor, the Russian media agency through a Twitter Inc (NASDAQ:TWTR) message, on Friday.
Apparently the Russian government had requested the two digital stores to delete the sale of two political books, one by Adolf Hitler, the father of Nazism and the second by Muslim writer Sa’id bin Ali bin Wahf Al-Qahtani.
The request was made, following a recent Russian court order which banned two works of Qahtani from being circulated. Mein Kampf, Hitler’s work has been banned in Russia for several years now.
Earlier Vadim Ampelonsky, the spokesperson for the Russian media agency had spoken on the Russian version of the BBC. He had discussed his agencies request to both Apple Inc and Google Inc to delete the sale of these books in Russia. He had also mentioned that he had reiterated the consequences of not deleting their circulation. Russia would not hesitate from blocking the App stores in the country.
Earlier in the week too, social networking sites, Facebook Inc, Twitter Inc as well as Google Inc were warned to follow the national legislation. He suggested that these networks had to comply with the regulations or risk being banned in the country. The agency had warned that these media networks had to agree and delete portion of content it deemed extremist, whenever it was requested by the Russian government.
With the latest censure by the Russian government not to allow the circulation of the ‘extremist’ works, the digital companies have registered the warning and deleted the works. It needs to be seen, how many such future requests will be adhered to, as Russia reels from the sanctions against it by the US government and its allies.
