Messaging app Telegram says its Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Pavel Durov, has nothing to hide following his arrest at the airport in France.

Durov, a 39-year-old billionaire, was arrested at Le Bourget airport outside Paris in Paris shortly after landing on a private jet on Saturday night from Azerbaijan.

The arrest of Russian-born Durov prompted a warning from Moscow to Paris that he should be accorded his rights, and criticism from X owner Elon Musk who said that free speech in Europe was under attack.

Telegram, in a statement released on Sunday night, gave no details of the arrest but said the Dubai-based company abided by European Union laws and its moderation was “within industry standards and constantly improving”.

It said: “Telegram CEO Pavel Durov has nothing to hide and travels frequently in Europe.

“It is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform.

Telegram CEO arrested at French airport

“We’re awaiting a prompt resolution of this situation. Telegram is with you all.”

Durov, who has dual French and United Arab Emirates (UAE) citizenship, was arrested as part of a preliminary police investigation into allegedly allowing a wide range of crimes due to a lack of moderators on Telegram and a lack of cooperation with police, a French police source told Reuters.

A cybersecurity gendarmerie unit and France’s national anti-fraud police unit are leading the investigation, the source said, adding that the investigative judge specialised in organised crime.

Telegram was founded by Durov, who left Russia in 2014 after he refused to comply with demands to shut down opposition communities on his VK social media platform, which he has sold.

The encrypted application, with close to 1 billion users, is particularly influential in Russia, Ukraine, and the republics of the former Soviet Union. It is ranked as one of the major social media platforms after Facebook, YouTube, WhatsApp, Instagram, TikTok, and WeChat.

Estimated by Forbes to have a fortune of $15.5 billion, Durov said in April some governments had sought to pressure him, but the app should remain a neutral platform and not a “player in geopolitics”.

The Star