Telegram CEO Pavel Durov, arrested in France

Telegram CEO Pavel Durov, has been arrested in France.

Pavel Durov, the Russian-French billonaire and founder and CEO of the messaging app Telegram, was arrested at Bourget airport on Saturday morning.

Durov was travelling aboard his private jet, adding he had been targeted by an arrest warrant in France as part of a preliminary police investigation.

Durov faces possible indictment today, according to French media. Telegram did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. The French Interior Ministry and police had no comment.

* Pavel Durov in Barcelona, February 23, 2016 during a conference *

Russian-born Durov founded Telegram with his brother in 2013. He left Russia in 2014 after refusing to comply with government demands to shut down opposition communities on his VKontakte social media platform, which he sold.

"I would rather be free than to take orders from anyone," Durov told U.S. journalist Tucker Carlson in April about his exit from Russia and search for a home for his company which included stints in Berlin, London, Singapore and San Francisco."

After Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Telegram has become the main source of unfiltered - and sometimes graphic and misleading - content from both sides about the war and the politics surrounding the conflict.

The platform has become what some analysts call 'a virtual battlefield' for the war, used heavily by Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and his officials, as well as the Russian government.

Telegram – which allows users to evade official scrutiny - has also become one of the few places where Russians can access independent news about the war after the Kremlin increased curbs on independent media following its invasion of Ukraine.