Google must be dismantled and pay more taxes in the EU, demanded the German media and culture minister, while Brussels hardens the tone with the US technological giant despite Donald Trump’s threats.
In a podcast of the Political Magazine that will be published on Friday, the conservative minister Wolfram Weimer attacked the Californian group, which is unjustly responsible for European digital players, according to him and must comply with the antimonopoly law.
This sanction has been hovering for several months in the United States in the Californian group for several months, accused of being a monopoly and convened by the United States government to separate from Chrome, its flagship browser. But Washington’s judges were more indulgent in early September, demanding that Google produce their investigation results and certain data to competing companies.
Trump threatens to batch
The German minister now has the EU regulations, “who is on the right path, but we need much more.” Wolfram Weimer also wants a stricter application of the European Fiscal Law in Google, “that practically does not pay taxes here and does nothing to society” despite the “huge margins.”
It is an explosive debate in progress between Brussels and Washington, while the 27 have been discussing US digital giants for several years, a project strongly criticized by Donald Trump. In May, Mr. Weimer had indicated to think of introducing a national tax revenue of Alphabet, Google’s mother company, which has Facebook.
The tensions revived in early September when the European Commission inflicted a fine of almost 3 billion euros on Google for abuse of a dominant position in online advertising. If the EU does not return to its decision, the United States will apply customs duties of retaliation, the US president threatened.
Google “changes the media landscape and, therefore, the country’s democratic bases,” added Mr. Weimer.
To resist his control, the minister recommends that public channels cooperate more with the media in the private sector.
Source: BFM TV
