Fabricated graphic spreads baseless claim military taking over Sri Lanka gas stations

"Orders have been given to take over fuel stations which do not provide fuel," reads part of a Sinhala-language Facebook post on March 2, 2025. "This is a people-oriented government, which implements people-friendly decisions."

It includes a purported news graphic that bears the News1st logo and features images of soldiers. Text written on the image says: "Army to seize fuel stations which do not distribute fuel" (archived link).

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Screenshot of the false Facebook post taken March 4, 2025

Similar Facebook posts shared the fake news graphic as fuel distributors halted selling on credit to government bodies in response to the state-run Ceylon Petroleum Corporation lowering their commission rates.

The dispute raised fears of a fuel shortage and prompted long lines at petrol stations, The Sunday Times newspaper reported (archived link).

The island nation is still reeling from its worst economic meltdown, defaulting on its $46 billion external debt in April 2022 as it ran out of foreign exchange to finance imports, causing painful shortages of food, fuel and medicines.

The government at the time deployed armed police and troops to guard fuel stations. Months of street protests led to the toppling of then-president Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who was accused of corruption and mismanagement (archived link).

His successor Ranil Wickremesinghe secured a bailout loan from the International Monetary Fund, which has said that the South Asian nation is making a recovery but is still not out of the woods (archived link).

Fabricated report

Sri Lanka's energy and defence ministries separately dismissed claims soldiers were recently ordered to take over petrol stations.

"This is fake. No such decision has been taken yet," Colonel Nalin Herath, spokesman for the Ministry of Defence, told AFP on March 3 (archived link). 

"No such necessity has arisen," a senior official from the Ministry of Energy also said.

A combination of reverse image and keyword searches found News1st published the original news graphic on Facebook on February 24. It is about shooting incidents linked to former military personnel who have abandoned their posts (archived here and here).

Its overlay states: "The Secretary of Defence says orders have been issued to arrest all the military members who have fled the tri-forces." 

The circulating graphic about soldiers taking over gas stations is "fake and not connected to News1st at all," Suranga Senanayake, channel head of the media organisation, told AFP on March 5. "The creators of that post illegally used our logo."

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Screenshot comparison of the fabricated graphic (left) and the Facebook post from News1st

The photos in the graphic -- which AFP photographer Ishara Kodikara both took -- do not depict Sri Lankan soldiers seizing gas stations.

The first shows military personnel keeping watch outside a church after a series of bomb blasts in April 2019. The second shows security personnel guarding former prime minister Mahinda Rajapaksa's official residence that protesters torched in May 2022.

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Screenshot of the pictures from AFP's archives