FB deactivted Hamza Ali Abbasi account
12 January, 2015
Pakistani actor and director Hamza Ali Abbasi Sunday 12,January,2015 said that Facebook authorities deactivated his profile and removed his status in which he had condemned the killings at the Parisian office of satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo.
The actor, who is vocal on social media about his views related to social issues, politics, culture, and religion had condemned the killings at Paris' Charlie Hebdo office last week and said, "even my blood boils when someone insults my Prophet (Peace be Upon Him) but that does not give individuals the right to kill".
In the status shared on his verified Facebook account – which has over 1.6 million followers – he said that while "freedom of expression should include criticism, disagreement or even rejection of faiths or ideology but should not and must not allow "insult".
Hamza went on to say that the West must revisit and fix its definition of ‘freedom of speech,’ otherwise someone from the two billion Muslim population "will go ballistic and kill unjustly".
"Would it be ‘freedom of expression’ if I brand black people as niggers or if I say Hitler was a messiah?" he added.
Internet rights groups in Pakistan had slammed Facebook ‘double standards’, a day after Pakistani actor and director Hamza Ali Abbasi Sunday said the network deactivated his profile and removed a post in which he had called on the West to rethink its definition of 'freedom of expression'.
The incident comes just days after Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg stressed on the company’s commitment to freedom of speech, and pointed out that a ‘extremist in Pakistan’ had tried to have him sentenced to death for refusing to ban content about Prophet Muhammad (Peace be Upon Him). In the January 9 post, he had said, "I won’t let that happen on Facebook. I’m committed to building a service where you can speak freely without fear of violence."
CEO and Founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg said his social network's removal of actor Hamza Ali Abbasi's status regarding the Charlie Hebdo attack and freedom of expression may have been a mistake.
When asked by one profile Angelic Munni what Zuckerberg has to say about his network's deletion of Hamza's post, Mark Zuckerberg responded: "I don't think this should have been blocked. Our team might have made a mistake. Justin, can you look into this?"
In the response, Zuckerberg tagged Justin Osofsky, whose Facebook profile identifies him as Vice President of Global Operations and Media Partnerships for Facebook. The CEO's comment has so far got over 950 'likes'.
|