This news report of a demolition incident in China's Xiamen city is from 2013
- This article is more than one year old.
- Published on October 26, 2021 at 10:56
- 2 min read
- By AFP Hong Kong
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The video has been viewed more than 1,000 times after it was shared here on Twitter on October 20, 2021.
Its simplified Chinese-language caption translates as: "On October 16, in Tong'an district, Xiamen, Fujian, city management officers were injured by sulfuric acid and 19 people were burned."
The post includes a hashtag that reads: "#NewsBreak".
The one-minute and 26-second video features a Mandarin-language news report about an incident in the southeast Chinese city of Xiamen in Fujian province.
The report bears the logo of Chinese state broadcaster CCTV. It states 19 city management officers were sprayed with sulfuric acid after forcibly demolishing an illegally constructed warehouse in Xiamen.
The video circulated online following reports about a person from the same province purportedly being pushed to the brink of despair by a housing dispute.
The video was also viewed more than 30,000 times in Twitter posts that make a similar claim here and here.
But the video has been shared in a misleading context. It shows an incident from eight years ago.
Keyword searches based on the video content found the news report was in fact published here on the official site of Chinese state media CCTV on October 18, 2013.
Below are three screenshot comparisons of the video in the misleading posts (L) and the CCTV video (R).
The same incident was also reported in 2013 by Chinese newspapers Chengdu Economic Daily here and People's Daily here.
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