As the devastating invasion of Ukraine rages on, the Ukraine Deputy Prime Minister Mykhailo Federov has called on Sony PlayStation, Microsoft Xbox and the gaming industry at large to cut off Russia and its market in a published open letter. The letter also specifically addresses esports platforms, as Russia is quite known in the CIS region for being quite active in certain esports titles.
Posted on the official account of Mykhailo Federov, Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine, here’s what the letter had to say:
To all game development companies and esports platforms,
The Russian Federation has carried out a deceptive and outrageous military attack on my country! Just imagine, in 2022, cruise missiles attack residential neighborhoods, kindergartens, and hospitals in the heart of Europe.
The armed forces and citizens are defending Ukraine till the end! The whole world is repelling the aggressor through the imposition of sanctions – the enemy must suffer significant losses. But we need your support – in 2022, modern technology is perhaps the best answer to the tanks, multiple rocket launchers (hrad) and missiles.
I am sure that you will not only hear, but also do everything possible to protect Ukraine, Europe, and, finally, the entire democractic world from bloody authoritarian aggression – and I appeal to temporarily block all Russian and Belorussian accounts, temporarily stop all the participation of Russian and Belorussian teams and gamers in all international esports events and cancel all international events holding on the territory of Russia and Belarus.
We are sure that such actions will motivate the citizens of Russia to proactively stop the disgraceful military aggression.
Yours Sincerely,
The letter itself tagged both the official Xbox and PlayStation Twitter accounts, which makes sense, given that besides Nintendo, these two are the largest gaming companies in the world. It’s yet unknown how these companies will respond, so stay tuned here at MP1st for more infomation once it drops!
Source: Twitter