Pavel Durov, the founder of Telegram, announced that he is ready to come to Romania and testify “if it helps democracy in Romania,” after George Simion announced that he would challenge the presidential election result at the CCR. Durov, who also published a message during Sunday’s election, accused the head of France’s foreign intelligence agency of asking him to ban conservative voices in Romania ahead of Sunday’s election, adding that he refused the request. The Russian-born man is under judicial control in France and cannot leave the country without the approval of French authorities.
In 2024, Pavel Durov was detained and later indicted in France for a series of offenses related to organized crime, with the court accusing him of failing to take action against the distribution of illegal content on the messaging service he founded. Released under a strict judicial supervision order that prohibited him from leaving French territory, he announced in March that he had “returned to Dubai.”
On Sunday, Durov stated that he was approached at the Crillon Hotel by Nicolas Lerner, head of France’s foreign intelligence agency, DGSE. “We didn’t block opposition figures in Russia, Belarus, or Iran. We won’t start doing it in Europe,” Durov wrote on X.
France’s DGSE said in a statement that its officials had met with Durov several times over the years “to firmly remind him of his and his company’s responsibilities in preventing terrorist threats and child pornography.” However, the DGSE “strongly rejects the accusations that, during those meetings, it requested the banning of accounts related to any electoral process,” the agency stated.
Durov now says he is “ready to come and testify if it helps Romania’s democracy.” He shared George Simion’s message calling on the Constitutional Court to annul Romania’s presidential elections.
On Sunday, Durov took to social media to accuse the French government, and then explicitly Nicolas Lerner, the head of the Directorate General for External Security (DGSE), of pressuring him to “silence conservative voices” on his platform in Romania ahead of the country’s elections, adding that he had refused the request.
More precisely, Telegram users in Romania received a message from an account attributed to Durov: “A Western European government (referring to France) contacted Telegram, asking us to silence conservative voices in Romania ahead of today’s presidential elections.” He went on to stress that he “categorically refused” the alleged request. “You can’t ‘defend democracy’ by destroying democracy. You can’t ‘fight election interference’ by interfering in elections. Either you have free speech and fair elections—or you don’t. And the Romanian people deserve both,” the message read.
The accusations circulating on Telegram were refuted by the French Embassy in Bucharest. French officials reminded the public that the 2024 presidential elections were annulled due to interference from the Russian Federation.
It wasn’t just the French Foreign Ministry that rejected the accusations. The DGSE itself took a rare public step, according to Le Monde, to “firmly reject allegations that requests were made to ban accounts related to any electoral process.”
According to a government official interviewed by Politico, Durov’s accusation may be related to Durov’s growing dissatisfaction with the legal proceedings against him in France.
Durov was arrested in August 2024 at a French airport and has been under strict judicial control since September last year, when he was indicted on six charges related to illegal activities on the messaging app he operates. He is not allowed to leave France without authorization—which he was granted for travel to Dubai between March 15 and April 7, according to the prosecutor’s office.
Originally from Russia, Durov holds citizenships in France and the United Arab Emirates, among others. Since his arrest, he has become increasingly critical of French authorities.
French officials recently denied Durov’s request to travel to the U.S. for “negotiations with investment funds.” The Paris prosecutor’s office told POLITICO it issued the decision on May 12 “on the grounds that such a trip abroad does not appear imperative or justified.”