London

For Elon Musk, looks like it didn't 'sink in' that he was not invited for a business summit in the UK. The billionaire has reacted on X, the social media platform he owns, with a cryptic post saying the UK releases paedophiles while jailing people for social media posts.

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"I don’t think anyone should go to the UK when they’re releasing convicted pedophiles in order to imprison people for social media posts," the Tesla boss said in the post on Thursday (Sep 26).

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Musk did not provide much context in his post, but he may have been referring to the sentencing of two men for posts on X and Facebook, during the hate-inspired violence that ravaged Britain in August. The other part of his post may be a criticism of the UK's scheme of early release of prisoners due to congestion in its jails. Some of those released are sex offenders.

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Tyler Kay, 26, was sentenced more than three years in jail in August for his posts on X calling for mass deportation of migrants and for attacks on hotels in the UK that were housing asylum seekers. Jordan Parlour, 28, was jailed for 20 months for Facebook posts calling for an attack on a hotel. 

What seems to have gotten the beef of the SpaceX founder is that he was not included in the list of invitees for Britain's International Investment Summit in October, to be hosted by Prime Minister Kier Starmer. The ambitious summit aims to bring leading investors to Britain in a bid to help its ailing economy.

During the August violence, Musk had made several critical posts against the British government, and specifically Starmer.

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The riots were sparked after false rumours that the culprit in a stabbing attack in Southport was an immigrant. Three children were killed in that attack.

Musk, the world's richest man, said on X at the time that UK was going into a civil war and even compared it to the erstwhile Soviet Union. 

Also read: 'Civil war is inevitable': Elon Musk vs Keir Starmer showdown on UK rioting

He called the British prime minister “two-tier Keir,” over what he felt was the less harsh action by police on non-white perpetrators of violence.

He also reshared a conspiracy theory that UK was building camps in the Falkland Islands to house rioters, before deleting it.

Also read: UK riots: Elon Musk calls PM 'two-tier Keir', compares Britain to Soviet Union

The British government at the time pushed back against Musk, calling his comments deplorable and unjustifiable.

Watch: UK: Keir Starmer rejects Elon Musk's 'civil war' remark

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In 2023, Musk was invited for, but didn't attend, a similar business summit held by the previous Conservative government, led at the time by Rishi Sunak.

He then appeared at a fireside chat with Sunak in November during the AI Safety Summit, of which he was a key organiser.

Starmer's Labour party politicians had criticised Sunak for his closeness to the tech billionaire, and the fact that he was treated like royalty, with the Tory PM appearing to be beholden to him.

It's not the first time that Musk has had run-ins with governments.

His negative comments on the UK comes a few days after his online spat with Brazil, whose Supreme Court banned X in the Latin American country.

(With inputs from agencies)