Out of the 197 fact-checking articles our team wrote in 2023, 52 of them concerned the war in Ukraine. And 50 of those highlighted pro-Russian disinformation aimed at discrediting Kyiv and the Ukrainian war effort.
Due to Russian aggression and occupiers' attacks on civilian infrastructure, only a third of Ukrainian schoolchildren have the opportunity to study full-time in a face-to-face format. More than 4,100 schools in Ukraine have been destroyed or damaged. That is why Ukrainian schools practice mixed methods - online and offline - in safe shelters underground.
German aid organizations allegedly demanded that money be spent on sick German children instead of tank deliveries to Ukraine. But the whole story is made up, and the video explaining it is a spoof.
Since the start of the war in Ukraine, some have claimed that "children" are being recruited into the Ukrainian army. Three viral photos, purporting to show graves of very young soldiers, have been shared since mid-August as evidence of this phenomenon. However, two of these three photos have been manipulated, and actually show the burial sites of adult men.
Russia is deceptively accusing Ukraine of Nazism and exploiting Romani-related subjects to do so. Natali Tomenko, a Romani activist from Ukraine, gave that assessment at a meeting on 30 March held under the auspices of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
Sick: BBC's fact-checking team have traced false claims of "baby factories" in Ukraine back to a notorious online hoax factory.
"Who would possibly lie about something like that?" you might reasonably ask yourself. Depressingly, we have the answer to that question.
Russian propaganda is spreading another fake in the form of a "questionnaire" filled with numerous errors and listing military activities which simply do not exist in the Ukrainian military. Children and minors are not involved in Ukraine's military service in any way. Mobilization is mandatory for individuals aged 18 to 60.
StopFake located the video being circulated in Russian media claiming to show children being sent to the front. The video turned out to be of an adult Ukrainian National guard serviceman.
A recent blog post builds on a fictitious narrative that Russian President Vladimir Putin is stymieing the production of adrenochrome in Ukraine.......We found no credible news reports or sources to corroborate the unfounded allegations, which were published on Real Raw News, a site that regularly posts fake news. The blog's stories are written by someone using a pseudonym and the site has a disclaimer saying it contains "humor, parody and satire," though the author has defended his stories as truth.
The same site wrote separately that Putin intercepted a shipment of adrenochrome bound for the United States. We rated that Pants on Fire!......We rate claims that Putin destroyed an adrenochrome warehouse in Ukraine Pants on Fire!
Adrenochrome features heavily in QAnon conspiracy theories, which purport the baseless idea that a global cabal of pedophiles is harvesting the chemical from the blood of children to stay young and healthy.
That's false, and so is the claim that Putin foiled a shipment of it.
We found no credible news reports or other sources to corroborate the claims in this post.
Real Raw News has a disclaimer saying it contains "humor, parody and satire," though the author has defended his stories as truth. The website also regularly publishes false, fantastical stories authored by someone using a pseudonym.
We rate this baseless post Pants on Fire!