Former MP George Galloway has threatened to take legal action against Twitter after his verified account on the platform was designated as “Russia state-affiliated media”.
Galloway said he does not present on Russian state media but appears in an episode of Sputnik: Orbiting the World published on Russia Today’s website on April 2, 2022.
Galloway presents the weekly television programme on the channel also known as RT UK.
However, Ofcom revoked the Kremlin-backed broadcaster licence with immediate effect in March.
Galloway also presents the talk show the Mother of All Talk Shows on Kremlin-owned Radio Sputnik.
RT is currently off air in the UK due to sanctions imposed over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Galloway is the leader of the minor political party the Workers Party of Britain. He was a Labour MP from 1987 until 2003 when he was expelled for bringing the party into disrepute.
On Wednesday, he wrote on Twitter: “Dear [Twitter Support] I am not ‘Russian State Affiliated media’.
“I work for no #Russian media. I have 400,000 followers. I’m the leader of a British political party and spent nearly 30 years in the British parliament. If you do not remove this designation I will take legal action.”
Twitter’s head of site integrity, Yoel Roth, announced in February that the social media platform was adding labels to tweets that share links to Russian state-affiliated media websites and were taking steps to “significantly reduce the circulation of this content”.
Since 2020, the site has added labels to state-affiliated media accounts, including to Russian-linked entities.
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