France's government has taken aim at Twitter after footage of two teenage boys allegedly raping a young girl was widely shared on the website.

Two 16-year-old boys have been arrested in Essonne on the outskirts of Paris over the alleged sex attack.

Footage of the suspected assault circulated widely on Twitter and police yesterday urged social media users not to share it any further.

Speaking to Le Parisien, equalities minister Marlene Schiappa said she had demanded that Twitter remove the video but said the social network was 'not up to it.'

Under fire: Twitter (whose logo is pictured) was accused of being 'not up to it' after footage of two teenage boys allegedly raping a young girl was widely shared on the website

'As soon as I heard about this, I immediately contacted Twitter to get this taken down,' Schiappa said.

'That social network is not up to it, criminals know that, that's why they use it.'

The two boys were charged with assaulting the teenage girl in a stairwell after they were arrested on Friday evening.

According to French media, the minute-long video shows the girl being threatened and insulted before she is attacked and raped by the two boys.

France's national police force said on Friday evening that many Twitter users had reported the video to them and urged people not to distribute it further.

'Thanks to your many reports, Essonne police rapidly arrested those behind the alleged rape and the video which was widely distributed yesterday on social networks,' they said.

'Thank you for your mobilisation. Thank you for not passing on this video.'

Twitter's rules say that 'media depicting sexual violence and/or assault is not permitted'.

'We prohibit violent sexual conduct to prevent the normalisation of sexual assault and non-consensual violence,' the website says.

Users who share such footage will be 'required to remove this content', but not necessarily banned, the rules suggest.

Accounts that are 'dedicated to posting this type of content' face a permanent ban from Twitter.