[arista]

[Pavel Durov, billionaire co-founder and
chief executive of the Telegram messaging app,
was arrested at the Bourget airport outside
Paris on Saturday evening,
TF1 TV said, citing an unnamed source.

Durov was travelling aboard his private jet,
TF1 said on its website, adding he had been
targeted by an arrest warrant in France.

The 39-year-old is understood to have
been travelling from Azerbaijan and
was arrested at about 8pm
local time (6pm GMT).

Durov was expected to appear in court on Sunday.

The Russia-born entrepreneur lives
in Dubai, where Telegram is based,
and holds dual citizenship of France
and the United Arab Emirates.

Durov, who is estimated by Forbes
to have a fortune of $15.5bn (£12bn),
left Russia in 2014 after he refused to
comply with demands to shut down
opposition communities on his
VK social media platform, which he sold.

Telegram did not immediately respond
to a Reuters request for comment.

Russia’s embassy in France is taking
“immediate steps” to clarify the situation.

Citing a representative from the
Russian embassy in France,
TASS reported there had been
no appeal from Durov’s team to
the embassy, but that it was proactively
taking “immediate” steps.

Durov and his brother Nikolai founded
the messaging app in 2013 and it has
about 900 million active users.]


https://www.theguardian.com/media/ar...french-airport