Twitter has apparently removed the account verification badge for Taliban leaders after being heavily criticised for giving blue verification to Taliban members.
Twitter has changed the blue tick verification system since Musk took over the company as its new CEO. The blue check was previously free of cost and given to only those accounts that were considered” active, notable and authentic accounts of public interest.” The system changed once Musk came into power. The blue check is now part of Twitter Blue subscription which gives access to blue tick along with host of other benefits to anyone who pays for it.
According to The Guardian, two prominent Taliban leaders- Hedayatullah Hedayat and Abdul Haq Hammad- lost the blue tick from their Twitter accounts soon after the public took notice of it and criticised the social media company for doing so.
Hedayatullah Hedayat, who describes himself as “Head of access to the information department” on Twitter, has over 187,000 followers while Abdul Haq- “Islamist Scholar, political analysis” as per his Twitter description, has over 177,000 followers.
According to the report, Hedayat got his blue tick back after it first was taken away from his account in December last year.
BBC on Tuesday reported that Hedayat and Haq started using Twitter Blue features. The report said that these two along with four other prominent supporters in Afghanistan were using the Twitter Blue features which wasn’t available to them previously. The report adds that a person who previously identified himself as a Taliban official even thanked Musk for Twitter Blue subscription and for “making Twitter great again.”
The report soon led to public outcry on Twitter with many users opposing the Taliban’s verification badge on Twitter given its endless records of violating human rights and close association with various terrorist organisations. The accounts of Hedayat and Haq do not have the blue tick at the time of writing this article.
Neither Twitter nor Musk has said anything on this until now.
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