Musk: 'In Uk civil war inevitable'. Starmer and his ministers: 'Irresponsible'
Verbal clash between several members of the British government and the patron of X over riots triggered by ultra-right groups
2' min read
2' min read
There is a verbal clash between British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Elon Musk, patron of X (formerly Twitter), over the riots unleashed by ultra-right-wing groups in the UK after the wave of misinformation and fake news on social media that followed the massacre of girls in Southport, near Liverpool.
Yesterday, the Labour prime minister's spokesman had described as 'unjustifiable' the comment posted by the tycoon under a tweet with a video of clashes in the British streets in which he said: 'Civil war is inevitable'. And today Deputy Justice Minister Heidi Alexander also criticised Musk for his 'irresponsible' behaviour.
The richest man in the world, who has already come under accusation several times for his posts and his management of the social network, also commented directly on the tweet published yesterday by Starmer in which he guaranteed the government's zero tolerance against the repeated attacks on Muslim communities and mosques carried out by the far-right fringes motivated by Islamophobic sentiment. "Shouldn't you be worried about attacks on all communities?" asked Musk in a polemical tone.
The verbal clash is set to go on as the minister responsible for Science and Technology, Peter Kyle, in a meeting with the social and web giants - TikTok, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Google, and X - asked for their cooperation to stop the spread of disinformation and incitement to hatred on their respective platforms. Even if, as the British media report, in recent days Musk had interacted via his X profile with a comment criticising Starmer of the fugitive Tommy Robinson, an extreme right-wing exponent on the run from justice who, from a luxury hotel in Cyprus, according to the revelations of the Mail, is continuing undisturbed to foment 'riots' in the kingdom via social networks. Moreover, the former leader of the English Defence League, a group with xenophobic and Islamophobic positions, had been readmitted to X last year after the tycoon bought the online platform, ending the ban imposed in 2018.
Government ready to deploy 6,000 officers against riots
Meanwhile, the UK government is ready to deploy '6,000 specialist police officers' to deal with the riots unleashed by ultra-right groups in the last week. This was stated in an interview with the BBC by Deputy Justice Minister Heidi Alexander after Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer yesterday promised an 'army' of extra officers on top of those already engaged in suppressing the riots along with other emergency measures. The police have been under extraordinary activity in the last few days in English cities and in some cases, such as in Southport, the local police had requested reinforcements from those in neighbouring counties.
