FB row: Oz undeterred, will go ahead with laws

AUSTRALIAN PM SCOTT MORRISON SAID HE DISCUSSED THE FB ISSUE WITH LEADERS FROM INDIA, UK, CANADA AND FRANCE

SYDNEY: Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison vowed on Friday to press ahead with laws to force Facebook to pay news outlets for content, saying he had received support from world leaders after the social media giant blacked out all media.

Facebook stripped the pages of domestic and foreign news outlets for Australians and blocked users of its platform from sharing any news content on Thursday, saying it had been left with no choice ahead of the new content laws.

The move, which also erased several state government and emergency department accounts, as well as non-profit charity sites, caused widespread outrage.

Morrison, who blasted Facebook on its own platform for “unfriending” Australia, said on Friday the leaders of Britain, Canada, France and India had shown support.

“There is a lot of world interest in what Australia is doing,” Morrison told reporters in Sydney. “That is why I invite... Facebook to constructively engage because they know that what Australia will do here is likely to be followed by many other Western jurisdictions.”

Canadian heritage minister Steven Guilbeault said late on Thursday his country would adopt the Australian approach as it crafts its own legislation in coming months.

The Australian law, which will force Facebook and Google to reach commercial deals with

Australian publishers or face compulsory arbitration, is expected to be passed by the Senate within the next week.

Australian treasurer Josh Frydenberg said he had spoken to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg for a second time following the news blackout. “We talked through their remaining issues and agreed our respective teams would work through them immediately. We’ll talk again over the weekend,” he said.

In its statement announcing the move in Australia, Facebook said the Australian law “misunderstood” its value to publishers. Frydenberg earlier told the Australian Broadcasting Corp that “there is something much bigger here at stake than just one or two commercial deals. This is about Australia’s sovereignty”.

Facebook and Alphabet owned Google had campaigned together against the laws with both threatening to withdraw key services from Australia if the laws took effect.