Old video recycled to falsely accuse the UN of child trafficking

This article is more than one year old.
Published on October 9, 2023 at 14:34
3 min read
By Tonye BAKARE, AFP Nigeria

Recent social media posts claimed that a video showed a mob attacking a United Nations vehicle in Senegal last year for allegedly conveying trafficked children. The claim is false: this is an older video from 2019 filmed in Zimbabwe and shows a bus belonging to a private security firm. At the time, local news outlets reported that one of the firm’s drivers was mistaken for a kidnapper. Moreover, the UN said the claim is “fake news” and that none of its agencies use the type of van seen in the video.

“On December 12, 2022 In Senegal, West Africa, a mob attacked a United Nations, vehicle early and discovered it carried kidnapped children for human trafficking and organ harvesting purposes before they freed them (sic),” reads a post published on X (formerly Twitter) on September 27, 2023.

A screenshot of the false post, taken on October 4, 2023

Reposted more than 13,000 times, the post features a two-minute clip showing an irate mob attacking a white vehicle. In the video, the crowd is seen forcing the door of the vehicle open to reveal children inside.

Several other accounts on Facebook shared the same claim, including here.

Child trafficking in West Africa

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said in a 2021 report that three out of four people trafficked in West Africa - where Senegal is located - were children (archived here).

“Out of 4,799 victims detected in 26 Sub-Saharan African countries, 3,336 were in West Africa including 2,553 children,” the report noted.

Many of the victims were trafficked within their countries, it said.

However, the claim that the video shows a UN vehicle used for child trafficking is false.

Old video from Zimbabwe

Two seconds into the video, the word “Sincere Security” can be seen written on the van. At the seven-second mark, an address — 33 Airdrie Road Eastlea — and telephone number can also be seen on the side of the van.

A keyword search for “Sincere Security Airdrie Road Eastlea” led to the contact page on the website of a private security company.

One of the telephone numbers listed on the company’s website also matches the number on the van.

Screenshots showing the address and phone number written on the bus and on Sincere Security’s website are the same, taken on October 5, 2023

Sincere Security Services says on its website that it was established in 2006 and that it is “a wholly Zimbabwean-owned entity” (archived here).

Another keyword search, this time for “Sincere Security kidnapped children”, led to a version of the video published by Zimbabwean news outlet ZimEye on April 19, 2019 (archived here).

The caption explained that the van in the video belonged to Sincere Security Services.

The outlet said in its report that the driver of the vehicle was driving his employer’s four children in Bulawayo, a city in southwest Zimbabwe when he was mistaken for a kidnapper (archived here).

Another local news report published the previous day said that the driver, described as a “security guard”, was taking the children to their parents (archived here).

‘Fake news’

A spokesperson for the UN office in Senegal, Cheikh Sakho, told AFP Fact Check that the claim that a UN vehicle was used for trafficking children was “fake news”.

“None of our agencies use this type of vehicle” seen in the video, said Sakho.

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