It seems that Crimea will continue to bring headaches for Apple after the company updated some apps to present the region to Russian users as though it’s part of Russia.
It was a controversial decision at the time and caused Apple to face much backlash.
Now, a group of 15 European Parliamentarians are asking Apple to reconsider this decision which – according to them – is a way to succumb to Russia’s political pressure to dominate the territory of Crimea.
The Crimean peninsula officially belongs to Ukraine, but since 2014, Russia has tried to invade it and so it is currently considered in the hands of the Russians (all through force).
In a move that seemed to be to please the Russian government, Apple updated its Weather and Maps apps to indicate that Crimea is within Russia’s territorial boundaries. However, this is only reflected on Apple devices within Russia, since – in the rest of the world – you can still see that it belongs to Ukraine.
The representative of Ukraine to the European Union, Mykola Tochitsky, published a Tweet with two petitions – the first being a letter to Germany and France asking them to support a call for the release Ukrainian prisoners in Russia, and the second addressed exclusively to Apple on the case of Crimea, indicating that they must place human rights over the profits generated by this movement.
The letter says:
“Apple’s troubling decision to adhere to Russian geopolitical pressure rather than acknowledge the humanity of those suffering must be challenged.
We are heartened by the rapid measures taken by Apple after initial reporting of the matter, but there is still more to be done…We rely on you to restore correct mentioning of Crimea as part of Ukraine in Apple Maps and Weather apps at the earliest possible time.”
Measures to satisfy regional governments
This is not the only action that Apple has taken to please certain governments. Let’s remember that recently, Apple removed from their smartphones software keyboards the flags of Taiwan, Hong Kong and other countries that are in disputes with the Chinese government, all to be able to maintain the sale of their products within the territory dominated by the Communist Party of China.
