AFP Fact Check
AFP Fact Check
Languages

This video of a Sanskrit teacher was recorded in London in November 2019

Published on Tuesday 7 April 2020 at 07:20
A video of a woman reciting Sanskrit verses has been viewed thousands of times on Facebook and Twitter alongside a claim that she was delivering sacred verses on a Spanish radio station during the novel coronavirus pandemic. The claim is false; the video was recorded by a London-based Sanskrit teacher who published the footage on her official social media accounts in November 2019, weeks before the novel coronavirus outbreak.
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AFP / Arun Chandrabose

Hoax circulates in India that government has banned coronavirus-related posts on social media

Published on Tuesday 7 April 2020 at 06:15
A claim that India’s Ministry of Home Affairs has made it a “punishable offence” for citizens to publish posts on social media about the novel coronavirus has been shared repeatedly on Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp. The claim is false; India’s official Press Information Bureau said it had made no such law; an online search for the purported government minister who issued the alleged ban yielded no results.
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This video has circulated in reports about people who died during the Hajj pilgrim to Saudi Arabia's Grand Mosque in August 2019

Published on Friday 3 April 2020 at 09:30Updated on Friday 3 April 2020 at 09:46
A video has been viewed thousands of times on Facebook and Twitter alongside a claim that it shows bodies being removed from a hospital in Iran during the novel coronavirus pandemic. The claim is false; the video has circulated in reports since at least August 2019 about a funeral procession for pilgrims who died during the annual Islamic pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia's Grand Mosque.
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This photo has circulated in reports about a couple at an airport in Barcelona in March 2020

Published on Thursday 2 April 2020 at 06:50
A photo of a man and woman embracing has been shared hundreds of times on Facebook and Twitter alongside a claim that it shows two Italian doctors who died of a novel coronavirus, COVID-19, after contracting the disease from the patients they treated. The claim is false; this is an Associated Press photo of a couple kissing at an airport in Barcelona, Spain.
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