Facebook mentions Kashmir as separate entity from India

NEW  DELHI — As Facebook announced it has removed thousands of fake Pages and accounts, the social media giant mentioned Kashmir separately along with India and a few other countries, giving an impression that Kashmir is independent of India.

Jammu and Kashmir is an Indian state and New Delhi views delinking it from India as a violation of its territorial integrity.

In a blog post on Tuesday, Facebook’s Head of Cybersecurity Policy mentioned Kashmir as a separate entity from India.

“Today, we removed 513 Pages, Groups and accounts for engaging in coordinated inauthentic behaviour as part of multiple networks tied to Iran,” said Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s Head of Cybersecurity Policy.

“They operated in Egypt, India, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, Kashmir, Kazakhstan or broadly across the Middle East and North Africa,” Gleicher added.

Facebook, which has already been pulled up by the Indian government for the spread of fake news and political interference on its platforms, did not immediately respond to a query sent by IANS.

Some of the axed Pages and accounts posted news stories on Indian politics as well as on the tension between India and Pakistan.

“They posted news stories on current events and frequently repurposed and amplified content from Iranian state media about topics including sanctions against Iran; tensions between India and Pakistan; conflicts in Syria and Yemen; terrorism; tensions between Israel and Palestine; Islamic religious issues; Indian politics; and the recent crisis in Venezuela,” the blog post noted.

Facebook said it removed a total of 2,632 Pages, Groups and accounts that were engaged in coordinated inauthentic behaviour from Iran, Russia, Macedonia and Kosovo on its platform, as well as on Instagram.