This video has circulated in news reports from 2018 about an incident in Colombia

"REMEMBER INDIA !! Soldiers don't fire unless attacked, even then they warn first".

"See this video, you will know #NagalandFiring," reads part of a post shared on Twitter here on December 7, 2021.

The video appears to show an altercation between civilians and soldiers in a field.

Image

Screenshot of the misleading post, taken on December 10, 2021

An elite military commando unit shot dead six coal miners returning to their homes in the Mon district of India's remote Nagaland state on Saturday, believing they were targeting insurgents.

Another eight people were killed by the troops after they were confronted by a furious crowd. 

In a tweet on December 5, Nagaland Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio appealed for calm and announced an investigation into the event.

Nagaland and other states in northeast India -- linked to the rest of the country by a narrow land corridor -- have seen decades of unrest among ethnic and separatist groups.

The region is home to dozens of tribal groups and small guerrilla armies whose demands range from greater autonomy to secession from India.

Over the years insurgency has waned, with many groups striking peace deals with the Indian government, but a large military garrison remains stationed in the region.

Rio also demanded New Delhi revoke the Armed Forces Special Powers Act -- a law that regulates military deployments in his state. 

The law gives troops broad protection from prosecution along with the powers to conduct arbitrary arrests, raids, and warrantless searches.

The video circulated alongside a similar claim on Facebook here and here, and on Twitter here.

Some social media users appeared to believe the video was connected to the incident in Nagaland -- with some people also using the video as justification for the army's actions.

"That's why the Indian army is the best," one person commented.

"The Indian army does not attack first," another wrote.

However, the video has been shared in a false context.

Colombia confrontation

A reverse image search using keyframes captured from the video, combined with keyword searches, found the video published in a news report from January 5, 2018 on YouTube by Colombian television news channel Cable Noticias.

The clip shared in the misleading posts can be seen from the video's 13-second mark.

The report's Spanish-language title translates as: "Confrontation between indigenous and military in Corinto, Cauca".

Corinto is a town and municipality in the Cauca Department of Colombia.

Below is a screenshot comparison of keyframes captured from the video in the misleading post (left) and the video news report on YouTube (right): 

Image

Screenshot comparison of stills captured from the misleading video (L) and the video news report on YouTube (R)

The video was also shared in a news report by another Colombian news outlet, Noticias Caracol, on January 5, 2018.

Translated to English, the Spanish-language headline of the news report reads: "Confrontation between the Army and indigenous people who wanted to take over a sugarcane farm in Cauca".

Below is a screenshot comparison of a keyframe captured from the video in the misleading post (left) and a keyframe from the video in the news report (right): 

Image

Screenshot comparison of a still captured from the video in the misleading post (left) and a still from the video in the news report (right)

The report says that according to an army statement, 50 individuals belonging to a group of indigenous people from northern Cauca intended to take over a sugarcane farm in the area.

They were embroiled in an altercation with military personnel in the area, but nobody was injured, according to the report.

AFP has previously debunked claims about militant conflicts between insurgents and soldiers in India's northeast.

Image