Nepal police open fire, killing 17 protesting social media ban

Valletta, Malta – Just after dawn on Tuesday, Nepalese police opened fire on a crowd protesting a surprise ban on TikTok and Facebook, leaving 17 dead and more than 200 wounded on the streets of Kathmandu. As Maltese commuters scrolled through the news over their morning kafè, the images felt eerily familiar: young faces lit by phone screens, streets echoing with chants, and the sudden crack of tear-gas canisters that could have been lifted straight out of last year’s Paceville protests against the island’s own nightlife restrictions.

For a country whose national motto is “Virtute et Constantia” – virtue and constancy – the events in Nepal strike a chord that reaches well beyond the Himalayas. Malta may be 6,500 kilometres away, but our shared reliance on digital platforms means the Nepalese shutdown is being watched as a cautionary tale in every corner of the archipelago, from Għarb to Għaxaq.

The ban, announced without parliamentary debate late Monday, targeted “foreign apps deemed harmful to social harmony.” Within minutes, Nepalese influencers who make their living on short-form videos lost their primary income. The parallel to Malta’s own creator economy is impossible to ignore: roughly 4,300 Maltese creators monetise content on TikTok alone, generating an estimated €14 million in annual revenue that trickles back into local bars, gyms, and boutique hotels. Last summer, when a brief glitch knocked Instagram offline for three hours, Paceville’s footfall dropped by 18 % – a statistic tourism officials still cite when lobbying for stronger digital infrastructure.

“Maltese creators know how fragile the online ecosystem is,” says Sarah Pace, founder of the Malta Digital Creators’ Association. “We’ve already had EU discussions about banning certain algorithms. If Brussels ever moved like Kathmandu did overnight, thousands of Maltese livelihoods would evaporate before the first ferry left for Gozo.”

Cultural echoes run deeper than economics. In Nepal, the platforms under fire are where a generation documented everything from earthquake rebuilding to feminist poetry slams. Similarly, Maltese youth use TikTok to remix traditional għana music with drill beats, turning 200-year-old melodies into viral dances. A sudden ban would not just mute influencers; it would silence a living archive of contemporary Maltese identity.

Father Joseph Borg, who lectures in media ethics at the University of Malta, sees spiritual stakes as well. “Our parishes stream Mass to the diaspora in Toronto and Sydney,” he notes. “If platforms disappear, we fracture the digital communion that keeps our scattered families together.”

Back in Kathmandu, relatives of the victims lit butter lamps along the Bagmati River, a ritual Maltese readers may compare to the candlelit vigils held outside the Basilica of Ta’ Pinu after every national tragedy. Nepalese civil society groups have called for a “digital bandh” – a total internet shutdown in solidarity – prompting Maltese NGOs to ask what a similar protest would look like on the islands. Would we block TikTok for a day, or would we march from Parliament to Castille, phones held high as both placards and periscopes?

By evening, the Maltese Foreign Affairs Ministry issued a terse statement urging “maximum restraint,” while the Malta Chamber of SMEs advised members with Nepalese suppliers to reroute orders through Indian ports. Meanwhile, a spontaneous fundraiser launched by a Sliema tech hub had already raised €11,000 for medical supplies in Kathmandu, proving once again that Malta’s tight-knit community punches above its weight.

As the sun sets over the Grand Harbour, the Nepalese flag flies at half-mast outside the embassy in Ta’ Xbiex. Maltese observers are left with a sobering reminder: in an age where identity is increasingly curated online, the power to unplug is also the power to erase. Whether we cherish carnival reels or earthquake memories, the lesson from Kathmandu is clear – silence travels faster than any signal, and the fight for digital freedom is no longer someone else’s story.