France and New Zealand jointly launch a new initiative ‘Christchurch Call’ against online extremism

At Paris summit, French President Emmanuel Macron and New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern launched an ambitious new initiative to eliminate terrorist and violent content online. The initiative, “Christchurch Call”, was pushed by Ms Ardern after a white supremacist gunned down 51 people at two mosques in the New Zealand city in March. Participants will be asked to commit to pledges to eliminate terrorist and violent extremist content on social media and other online platforms. The political meeting will run in parallel to an initiative launched by Macron called ‘Tech for Good’ which will bring together 80 tech chiefs in Paris to find a way for new technologies to work for the common good. The Paris summit comes as there is a growing realisation that the current abuse of social media by extremists must be countered, after the Christchurch attacker broadcast live footage on Facebook from a head-mounted camera.