Latest fact checks & sources

“On July 11, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov criticized Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda’s proposal to establish permanent military NATO bases near the Russian border, claiming that Russia never moved its military infrastructure westward. That is false. Below is a brief catalog of Russian military progress in Europe.”

Columnist Max Boot writes: “The Ukrainian counteroffensive is less than a month old and already the murmurs of defeatism are starting, with unnamed “Western officials” telling CNN that it is “not meeting expectations on any front.” Even Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky concedes that the counteroffensive is going “slower than desired.” In truth, the plodding pace of the advance should not be a surprise or a cause for serious concern, yet.”

“For Ukraine’s counteroffensive to progress faster, Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, the top officer in Ukraine’s armed forces, says he needs more — of every weapon. And he is telling anyone who will listen, including his American counterpart, Gen. Mark A. Milley, as recently as Wednesday, that he needs those resources now.”

The screenshot was tweeted by the Russian embassy in South Africa. But a Politico spokesperson says the article was not published by the US-based news outlet.

There is no evidence that any weapons provided to Ukraine by Western partners were used during the recent protests in France.

NATO’s official languages are French and English.

A TikTok video shared thousands of times claims to show President Emmanuel Macron apologising to France’s former African colonies and pledging reparations during a UN speech in New York in April 2023. But the claim is false: AFP Fact Check traced the footage of the address to a speech from last September and found that the original English translation was replaced with a fake voiceover. Macron did not discuss Africa but talked about the Russian-Ukrainian invasion.

The Anti-Defamation League explains the historical context and background of the “blood libel” – a common lie used to incite mass violence against Jews throughout the Middle Ages and well into modern times. The blood libel in its modern incarnations still exists and holds sway over many today.

BBC News debunks several disinformation narratives making the rounds on Twitter – amplified in particular by paid “blue check” accounts: – Weapons for Ukraine not used in French riots – No evidence of ‘baby factories’ in Ukraine – Kramatorsk missile not Ukrainian – Zelensky has not cancelled elections

There’s been much anti-Ukraine and anti-Zelensky propaganda circulating online since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. But a new billboard has just appeared name-dropping Ukraine’s leader on New York’s Fifth Avenue above a busy flagship store. Many factors point to the video being manipulated. Vedika Bahl explains in this edition of Truth or Fake.

So far Newsweek has been unable to find any evidence to support the “meat cube” claims. According to local reports, the images of slabs of meat packed in between wooden craters show leftovers of expired animal feed in Russia’s Belgorod region, not the bodies of Russian soldiers.

Russian propagandists have created a fake site to spread false information about Ukrainian counteroffensive losses. There are no public forums or organizations that track counteroffensive casualty numbers. This information is confidential. Ukrainian military and their allies note that Ukrainian Armed Forces losses are much smaller than those incurred by the Russian army.

Several churches and a Jewish yeshiva destroyed or damaged by Russian shelling. BBC News report from March 2022.

In an interview with five European publications, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said she cannot say exactly when Ukraine will join the EU, as the time frame depends on two factors, internal EU processes and the progress of reforms in Ukraine. At the same time, von der Leyen emphasized that in the long run, Ukraine and the Balkans “cannot but integrate into the EU.”

An “advertising poster” in the photo was faked. The press service of the Ministry of National Defense of Poland, at the request of a StopFake journalist, stated that none of their departments responsible for recruiting candidates for the Polish Army is the author of this poster.

UNESCO list of damaged cultural sites in Ukraine – 260 as of 19 June. (Note that this list includes only those sites that have been verified by UNESCO – a complete list would be far longer.)

The video shared on Twitter has been edited. The explosion seen in the film is a video effect, available on TikTok. The original video, which has been shared on other social media for at least seven months, shows the soldier using the shell to hammer a component into the tank before turning and smiling at a group behind him.

The Ukrainian Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief Valery Zaluzhny did not say that the Ukrainian counteroffensive had turned into a clown show. He only emphasized that despite the lack of crucial weapons and equipment, the Ukrainian military are gaining ground every day.

Snopes.com has been fact-checking memes and legends on the internet since 1995.

While Congress has allocated $113 billion worth of spending toward Ukraine, analysis of that spending shows that a significant proportion will not go directly to Kyiv. Analysis by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, which tracks U.S. spending in Ukraine, has suggested the total direct spend to be around $77 billion.