Category China

False subtitles added to video suggest Polish president ‘mobilises troops to enter Ukraine’

Multiple social media posts in China have shared a video alongside a claim it shows the Polish president declaring military mobilisation in support of Ukraine. Although Poland sent weapons aid to Ukraine after Russia's invasion, misleading Chinese-language subtitles have been added to the clip to suggest it was sending troops to war. The Polish defence ministry dismissed the claim. As of May 26, AFP found no official reports that Poland was sending troops to Ukraine.

May 27, 2022

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No, the infamous Canadian sniper Wali has not been killed in Ukraine

A number of viral posts on social media have claimed that a Canadian sniper, dubbed "the world's deadliest sniper", was killed within hours of arriving in Mariupol, Ukraine, where he had gone to fight. However the man, nicknamed Wali, is still alive and well. He told the FRANCE 24 Observers team that he thinks the disinformation around his death serves to dissuade foreign fighters from going to Ukraine.

March 23, 2022

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Posts misleadingly link pharmaceutical event in India with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine

Several images have been shared repeatedly in social media posts that claim they show a minaret in India's capital lit up with the colours of the Russian flag to show "support" for Moscow's invasion of Ukraine. The posts circulated online after a similar tweet was shared by the state-run Chinese tabloid Global Times. The claim is misleading: the Indian government said the building in New Delhi was illuminated as part of a week-long event to promote affordable medicines. Local media reports also said the minaret was illuminated for the pharmaceutical event, not Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

March 21, 2022

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Old photos digitally altered to include China’s national flag

Picture showing cars with smashed windows are circulating in multiple social media posts that claim they are vehicles in Ukraine targeted after the Russian invasion for displaying stickers of the Chinese flag. In fact, the pictures were digitally altered to add the flag and were taken years before Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

March 15, 2022

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Ukraine recognized downed pilot as ‘hero,’ but claims he was the ‘Ghost of Kyiv’ are unsubstantiated

Col. Oleksandr "Grey Wolf" Oksanchenko, a decorated Ukrainian pilot, was killed in combat on Feb. 25.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky awarded him posthumously with the title of Hero of Ukraine, along with 11 other military service members.

Unconfirmed reports hold that an unidentified pilot, who has come to be called the "Ghost of Kyiv," downed six Russian planes on the first day of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. We do not find evidence that this was Oksanchenko.

It's uncertain how the Ghost of Kyiv tale originated, but we know that Ukraine's military reported on Feb. 24 that at least six Russian planes and two helicopters had been downed. Crediting Ukrainian military, CNN and NBC soon reported five Russian planes and one helicopter had been shot down. Russia's defense ministry denied the report, according to Reuters, and said that Ukraine's air force defenses had been "suppressed."

Ukraine's official Twitter account, meanwhile, promoted the Ghost of Kyiv narrative with a video that suggested the mystery pilot could have been responsible for as many as 10 downed Russian aircraft by Feb. 26. That video, too, included footage from a video game.

PolitiFact did not receive a response from Zelensky's administration about Oksanchenko and the Ghost of Kyiv claim.

Finding no conclusive information tying Oksanchenko to the Ghost of Kyiv, we rate this claim False.

March 14, 2022

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China repeats false claim that U.S has biolabs in Ukraine

China's government is amplifying debunked claims about non-existent U.S. biological weapons labs in Ukraine, bringing the falsehoods back into the spotlight on social media.

Our ruling
A spokesperson for the Chinese government said the U.S. has biolabs in Ukraine.

The claim originated with the Russian government and has been previously debunked by U.S. government officials and weapons control advocates. Following Zhao's March 9 remarks, U.S. government officials strongly refuted the claims again, saying the false narrative was being used to lay the groundwork for further violence in Ukraine.

March 10, 2022

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This video shows an explosion in China in 2015, not Ukraine in 2022

As Russian troops invaded Ukraine, a video was viewed hundreds of thousands of times in social media posts that claimed it showed a huge explosion at a power plant in the separatist Luhansk region. While there have been reports of a fire at a power plant in the region, the video has been shared in a false context. It actually shows a deadly blast that ripped through the Chinese port city of Tianjin in 2015.

March 4, 2022

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