This video shows a Belarusian band singing a Chinese song before the COVID-19 outbreak

  • This article is more than one year old.
  • Published on April 6, 2020 at 10:40
  • 3 min read
  • By AFP Hong Kong
A video has been viewed tens of thousands of times on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube alongside a claim it shows Italian nationals expressing their gratitude to China for providing aid during the novel coronavirus pandemic. The claim is false; the video shows a Belarusian band singing a Chinese song several months before COVID-19 was first detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan.

The video was published here on Facebook on March 23, 2020. It has been viewed more than 42,000 times.

The three-minute 27-second video shows a group of five Caucasian men singing an acapella version of the Chinese song “Qinghai-Tibet Plateau”.

Below is a screenshot of the misleading Facebook post:

Image
Screenshot of the misleading Facebook post

The post’s simplified Chinese caption translates into English as: “To express thanks to Chinese people for their help, Italians sang ‘Qinghai-Tibet Plateau’ in Chinese language”.

As of April 6, the novel coronavirus has killed at least 15,887 people in Italy.

The video was also shared here, here and here on Facebook, here, here and here on Twitter, and here and here on YouTube, alongside a similar claim.

The claim is false. A keyword search on Google found an identical video posted on the YouTube channel of a Belarusian band, Clear Voice, on August 26, 2019.

The video is titled: “Чистый голос - 青藏高原 - Qinghai - Tibetan Plateau - Тибетское плато (a cappella)”.

The same video was also published on the quintet’s official Instagram account here on August 30, 2019. 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Друзья, спешим поделиться премьерой нового клипа!!!! Тибетское плато 青藏高原 (a cappella) приятного просмотра:)) ?? Полная версия клипа (Full version) ?? https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KEGpHQhbuzc ???#чистыйголос #chistiygolos #тимбилдинг #концертмечты #мероприятие #шоу #show #голос #музыканты #артисты #живаямузыка #сотрудничество #красиво #вокалмечты #музыка #живойзвук #минск #выступление #фестиваль #искусство

ЧИСТЫЙ ГОЛОС (@chistiy_golos) 分享的帖子 ·

Is there content that you would like AFP to fact-check? Get in touch.

Contact us