WION promoted the hashtag #YouTubeUnblockWION to spread the word that went viral and received nearly 25,000 tweets in support overnight.
Essel Group-owned World is One News (WION) channel was blocked by YouTube on March 22, allowing no new videos to upload or stream. For the unversed, WION has been reporting diligently on the Russian invasion of Ukraine from the ground in an unbiased manner.
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However, after massive outrage and support from the people and WION's users, YouTube had to unblock WION on Saturday. The channel is back online and running well.
Allegedly YouTube had a problem with a video uploaded by WION from March 10 that included two live speeches by Ukraine's foreign minister Dmitry Kuleba and Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov.
The channel received a message from YouTube on March 22, stating that the channel is getting blocked from posting any videos since that single video had violated YouTube's community guidelines.
After which, WION made an appeal to restore their channel that was denied. WION again wrote to YouTube asking for an explanation for blocking the channel to which they said, "Our community guidelines prohibit content denying, minimizing, or trivialising well-documented violent events, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Under this policy, we have removed content, for example, denying that Russia invaded Ukraine or alleging that Ukrainian victims are crisis actors."
The video contained Sergei Lavrov's speech that stated, "As for your question about whether we are planning to attack other countries. We are not planning to attack other countries. We did not attack Ukraine either. We explained on numerous occasions that there was a situation that posed a direct threat to the security of the Russian Federation."
For clarification, this was a Russian Minister speaking and not WION's own views. andneither did the channel endorse it. As a part of unbiased reportage, the channel is bound to show both sides of the story and it played the Russian minister's interview just like they played the Ukrainian minister's statement.
WION promoted the hashtag #YouTubeUnblockWION to spread the word that went viral and received nearly 25,000 tweets in support overnight.
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