Facebook removes, then reinstates, page of British anti-racism organisation

By Catarina Demony

LONDON (Reuters) - One of Britain's biggest anti-racism organisations, Stand Up to Racism, said on Wednesday its Facebook page had been shut down for allegedly breaching the social media platform's community standards on impersonation, though it was later reinstated.

Facebook's owner, Meta Platforms, said the page had been removed in error and it had since been restored.

Stand Up to Racism said in a statement the page was removed after it shared a post about a hand gesture made by Elon Musk during a celebration of President Donald Trump's inauguration.

Earlier this month, Meta scrapped its U.S. fact-checking programme and reduced curbs on discussions around topics "that are part of mainstream discourse" such as immigration and gender identity, and moved to a Community Notes model instead.

A screenshot from Stand up to Racism did not provide more specific reasons for the ban. The organisation attributed the ban to its post about Musk.

The Facebook notification on the screenshot said: "We've reviewed your page again. We've confirmed that it does not follow our community standards on impersonation. As a result we've removed your page. We know that this is disappointing but we want to keep Facebook safe and welcoming for everyone."

Musk's hand gesture at an event in Washington on Monday has been likened to a Nazi salute. Musk, the world's richest person and an ally of Trump, dismissed the criticism, saying: "The 'everyone is Hitler' attack is sooo tired."

Stand Up to Racism, which campaigns against racism, posted a picture of Musk making the gesture on Facebook on Tuesday, and suggested it might give confidence "to every fascist".

(Reporting by Catarina Demony; Additional reporting by Supantha Mukherjee in Stockholm; Editing by Bernadette Baum)