Fake CNN screenshot misleads on war in Ukraine
- This article is more than one year old.
- Published on March 4, 2022 at 22:20
- 3 min read
- By AFP USA, Manon JACOB,
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"Hey look this happened in 2015 not 2022 what else are the media lying about?" asks a March 4, 2022 Facebook post that includes what appears to be a still image of a CNN broadcast about Ukraine next to two images of an explosion said to have taken place seven years prior. The chyron on the image with the network's logo says: "FIREY BUT MOSTLY PEACEFUL EXPLOSION IN THE UKRAINE."
Other Facebook posts, including here, here and here, shared the same three images and the text: "The exact same explosion, 7 years apart..."
The same collage of images was posted on a website hosting memes. The posts offered no additional information about what was purported to have been a 2015 Ukraine explosion.
The posts follow a pattern of social media content accusing CNN and other broadcasters of misleading the public about the ongoing crisis in Ukraine, following Russia's February 24 invasion, part of a flurry of misinformation about the conflict.
But CNN publicist Lauren Bobek told AFP the image of the broadcast is "doctored" and "not real."
"Fiery but mostly peaceful protests" is a direct reference to a CNN chyron that aired on August 25, 2020 during a live conversation with correspondent Omar Jimenez who was covering violence in Kenosha, Wisconsin, following a shooting by a white policeman of a Black man, Jacob Blake, during an arrest, that left him paralyzed.
AFP Fact Check previously debunked posts about Afghanistan that included a different fake CNN image, also referencing the ridiculed caption.
Explosion in Kyiv
CNN did share the photo of the explosion in an online gallery about the war.
It credits the image to the Office of Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky saying in the caption: "A photo provided by the Ukrainian President's office appears to show an explosion in Kyiv early on February 24."
The images on the right side of the collage in the Facebook posts are two close-ups of the photo of the February 24 explosion near Kyiv.
Reverse image searches do not find these images prior to 2022.
Biden's silhouette
AFP also found, through a search on Google Lens, that silhouettes had been added to the image. The figures pictured are President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden, taken from an AP photo published on December 28, 2021.
The silhouette in the middle is their dog, Commander, also present in the original AP image.
More than 1.2 million people have fled Ukraine into neighboring countries since Russia launched its full-scale invasion on February 24, United Nations figures showed on March 4.
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