Uzbekistan’s ambassador, FB representative discuss combating extremism

The Ambassador of Uzbekistan to the United States, Javlon Vakhabov, met with Andy O’Connell, Director of Facebook’s product policy and strategy division, to discuss the prospects for establishing partnerships in the field of introducing innovations and modern technologies in the development of the domestic economy, as well as helping the American side in the field of professional development of Uzbek IT specialists. 

According to Dunyo IA, the Facebook (FB) representative expressed his readiness to assist in the training of gifted IT specialists, to receive representatives of the country at the company's head office. During the negotiations, it was also noted that every interested student in Uzbekistan can apply for internships in the American company through a specially created web page on its website. 

During the negotiations, special emphasis was placed on the need to improve the interaction of the parties to prevent violent extremism and radicalization on the Internet, in particular, through the platforms Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. It was emphasized that the priority tasks of the government of Uzbekistan in this matter are to increase the resilience of young people to the propagation of ideas of extremism, to timely prevent people living and working abroad from falling under the influence of extremists.

The Facebook management fully supported the desire of the Uzbek side to closely cooperate with the company on the timely elimination of any sources of extremist ideology and online recruitment networks of terrorist groups.

Andy O’Connell stated that Meta Platforms, Inc. in general, and its division Facebook will welcome the active interaction of the parties in this direction.

At the end of the meeting, the embassy expressed gratitude to Andy O’Connell for verifying the status of the official FB page of the Uzbek Embassy in Washington.