ALBAWABA - Elon Musk, owner of X (formerly Twitter) was given a warning by a court of the Brazil Supreme Court on Wednesday, threatening to halt X in the biggest country in Latin America if the billionaire failed to designate a local legal representation for the platform within 24 hours, Axios reports.
The move intensifies a months-long dispute between Musk and Judge Alexandre de Moraes of the Brazilian Supreme Court, who has already banned hundreds of X accounts for allegedly promoting hate speech and misinformation.
The court order from Justice Alexandre de Moraes informs Musk that X has until Thursday at about 8 p.m. local time (7 p.m. ET) to abide with the ruling. The announcement was made earlier this month by the platform, which said that it will shut down its activities in Brazil due to what it dubbed the judge's "censorship orders."
Earlier in the month, X said that it was dismissing all of its remaining Brazilian employees from the country "effective immediately," citing de Moraes' threats to arrest the company's national representative, according to ABC News.
“In case of non-compliance with the determination, the decision could bring about suspension of the social media network’s activities in Brazil,” the court said in a statement.
Musk countered on X, saying that “this 'judge' has repeatedly broken the laws he has sworn to uphold,” adding that if X had agreed to act on Moraes's orders, "there was no way we could explain our actions without being ashamed."
