The President of France, Emmanuel Macron, has accused the owner of social media platform, X, Elon Musk of interfering in European politics, including the German election.

 

The French president disclosed this in a speech to French ambassadors on Monday.

 

Macron said, many years ago, no one could imagine that X, one of the world’s largest social media networks, would declare support for what he described as ‘a new international reactionary movement and intervene in elections, including in Germany.

 

“Ten years ago, who could have imagined it if we had been told that the owner of one of the largest social networks in the world would support a new international reactionary movement and intervene directly in elections, including in Germany?”

 

Macron also said in the speech that Donald Trump, the United States president-elect, “knows he has a strong ally in France.”.

 

This comes after Mr Musk expressed support for the hard-right Alternative for Germany, AfD party on his social media platform X and in an opinion column for the Welt am Sonntag newspaper.

 

The Tesla billionaire’s piece claimed, “The portrayal of the AfD as rightwing extremist is clearly false, considering that Alice Weidel, the party’s leader, has a same-sex partner from Sri Lanka! Does that sound like Hitler to you? Please!”

 

The newspaper’s opinion editor later said she resigned over the piece, which appeared online and in print.

 

Recall that the German government barely six days ago accused Musk of trying to interfere in its elections.

 

Recall that in the build-up to the US presidential election in November last year, Musk was among the US billionaires who endorsed Trump.