Some Instagram and Twitter accounts are posting a graffiti image that's allegedly appearing in Paris and Poland of President Volodymyr Zelensky, represented as a money-sucking black hole. Russian media was quick to share the alleged street art, claiming that "taxpayers from Europe are increasingly dissatisfied with supporting Ukraine". We tell you more in this edition of Truth or Fake.
Ukraine is apparently in the process of developing a so-called dirty bomb - a bomb containing radioactive elements - or, at least, that's the narrative that Moscow has been peddling since October 23, 2022. The Russian Ministry of Defence posted these claims to Telegram and Twitter, along with illustrated documents meant to support these claims. But the images published in these documents are old and some of them were even taken in Russia.
Some pro-Russian web users in West Africa have been sharing a photo that allegedly illustrates the destruction of a Ukrainian military base in Odesa on September 25. However, the photo has nothing to do with the war in Ukraine. We tell you more in this edition of Truth or Fake.
There are about 200 million people who use Twitter on a daily basis, making it an important site for news and information. But this social network is also a prime source of disinformation, from fake accounts to tweets taken out of context. The FRANCE 24 Observers team takes a look at some good habits to avoid falling into these Twitter traps.
A recent Politico article has given rise to Russian propagandist manipulation about European promises to Ukraine. The article makes no mention about discarded European promises and focuses on two problems: the current depletion of weapons stocks in those countries that have been actively helping Ukraine since the beginning of the war, and the delay in the transfer of weapons from Germany and France to Ukraine. Because of this, six European countries did not make new weapons commitments in July, however, they did not renounce their previous ones. A pause in military transfers is not a point of no return, it is just that, a pause, to be renewed in the future.
According to a YouGov poll, the idea of introducing new additional sanctions against Russia has strong support among Europeans: 74% of those surveyed in Poland, 75% in the UK, 76% in Spain, 55% in Germany, 56% in Italy, 62% in France, all support the introduction of additional economic sanctions against Russia in their country. What the Europeans are unwilling to support are further sanctions against Russia if it would negatively impact their own standard of living. It was this single indicator - one of many in the survey - that the Kremlin media focused on, portraying it as the overall European sentiment on sanctions, thereby manipulating the integrity of the YouGov survey data.
A video viewed more than 300,000 times on Facebook has been shared alongside claims that it shows Russian and Ukrainian soldiers fighting in February 2022. This is false; the video, which has been online since at least 2019, shows troops of the French Foreign Legion in battle, although it remains unclear where the footage was filmed.
According to the French Ministry of the Interior, as of March 31, the number of non-Europeans among the more than 26,000 Ukrainian refugees who arrived in France is less than 5%.
A video that appears to show explosions in the French capital of Paris has been viewed thousands of times in misleading social media posts that claim it shows a real attack on the Eiffel Tower. The posts suggest the attack was carried out by Russian forces in response to sanctions from foreign powers following its invasion of neighbouring Ukraine. The footage, however, has been shared in a false context: it shows a fictional film created by a French director that was then shared online by Ukrainian officials in a bid to urge European authorities to impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine.
Online posts claim the Statue of Liberty in New York City was adorned with a Ukrainian flag as a sign of solidarity following the Russian invasion. But a reverse image search found that the photo shows a replica Statue of Liberty located in Colmar, France, that was also photographed on March 2, 2022 by AFP.