Russia has opened a criminal case against Facebook after the social network changed its hate speech rules to allow users to call for “death to the Russian invaders”

Two weeks into Russia’s war in Ukraine, a Meta spokesperson said on Thursday the company had temporarily eased its rules for political speech, allowing posts such as “death to the Russian invaders.”

The company says it won’t allow calls for violence against Russian civilians.

Russian prosecutors asked a court to designate the U.S. tech giant as an “extremist organization,” and the communications regulator said it was restricting access to Meta’s Instagram.

The Investigative Committee said the Facebook move could violate articles of the Russian criminal law against public calls for extremist activities.

“Such actions of the (Meta) company’s management not only form an idea that terrorist activity is permissible, but are aimed at inciting hatred and enmity towards the citizens of the Russian Federation,” the state prosecutor’s office said.

Information war

“A criminal case has been initiated … in connection with illegal calls for murder and violence against citizens of the Russian Federation by employees of the American company Meta, which owns the social networks Facebook and Instagram,” Russia’s Investigative Committee said.

Meta says the temporary changes aim to allow for forms of political expression that would normally violate its rules.

Meta’s head of global affairs, Nick Clegg, says the company’s changes on speech in the context of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will only apply in Ukraine itself.

He said in a statement that the policies were “focused on protecting people’s rights to speech as an expression of self-defense in reaction to a military invasion of their country.”