Old war footage filmed in Sri Lanka, not Myanmar

"Military attacking AA base in Minbya. The video was posted by an AA soldier," reads a Burmese-language Facebook post on July 25, 2025.

The Arakan Army (AA) is an ethnic minority rebel group that controls key towns of western Rakhine state.

The region has emerged as a key front in Myanmar's highly fractured civil war, pitching a myriad of ethnic minority rebels and pro-democracy fighters against the junta that seized power in a 2021 coup (archived link). 

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Screenshot of the false post taken August 25, 2025, post with a red X marked by AFP

The video surfaced in multiple other Facebook posts as Myanmar's junta said in August it recaptured keys towns under the control of rebels group in other parts of the country (archived link).

But a reverse image search of keyframes on Google found a longer clip was uploaded on the YouTube channel of journalist Amal Samantha on January 25, 2021.

"SL Army entered Chalai and Tiger's boasts," reads its Sinhala-language title (archived link). 

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Screenshot comparison of the video in the false posts (L) and the YouTube video from Amal Samantha

AFP reached out to Samantha who confirmed the video is his. 

"This is my video. Sri Lanka Air force MI 24 Helicopter Gunship attacks LTTE terrorist bunker line in northern Sri Lanka in war period 2009," he told AFP in an email on August 19, 2025.

Sri Lanka's 26-year civil war killed about 100,000 people and set development back by decades, ending only after the Tamil rebels fighting for autonomy were massacred in 2009. The operation was condemned internationally for the indiscriminate bombardment of civilians (archived link).

AFP has previously debunked misinformation related to Myanmar unrest here.