This week, Telegram channels distributed a couple of covers of foreign publications with cartoons on the topic of Pope Francis’ statements about the cruelty of the Buryats and Chechens. We have verified the accuracy of these images.
French magazine Charlie Hebdo
The first cover, which went viral at the end of November 2022, was allegedly published by the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. In one of the publications with this picture it says the following: “Charlie Hebdo went over the completely idiotic statement of the Pope, who stated that “Buryats and Chechens are particularly cruel.” The French, obviously, are hinting at the “love” of the Catholic Church for children, look at how the boy is “kept” from the dangerous Buryat.” The viral cartoon shows the head of the Catholic Church feeling a child's back and saying (translation from French taken from the above post): “Keep your children away from these cruel and dangerous Buryats!” Nearby is a picture of a man in Buddhist robes photographing Jesus on the crucifixion.
You can find publications with this cover in Telegram channels "Ostashko! Important"(99,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Voenkor Kitten Z"(197,000, already deleted), "Tynu40k Goblina (oper.ru)"(216,000), "Uncle Slava" (77 00), "Before everyone else. Well almost. Special operation" (11,000) and "Rogandar news: News, facts, events!"(46,000), in public pages on VKontakte (examples here, here And here) and on users’ personal pages (here, here And here), as well as in blogs on "Zene" The cartoon also went viral on Twitter (here, here And here).
First, let’s look at the facts that served as “sources of inspiration” for the author of the cartoon in question. We are talking about the statement of Pope Francis, which he did, commenting on the conflict in Ukraine during an interview with America magazine. The conversation with the pontiff took place on November 22, 2022, and its text was published on November 28. During it, the correspondent said that many in the United States were confused by the pope’s reluctance to directly criticize Russia, and asked why Francis prefers to talk about ending the war in general terms. “When I talk about Ukraine, I talk about a people who suffered martyrdom. If there are martyrs, there is someone who tortures them. When I talk about Ukraine, I talk about brutality because I have a lot of information about the brutality of the troops being brought in. In general, the most cruel are probably those who are from Russia, but do not adhere to the Russian tradition, such as Chechens, Buryats, and so on. Of course, this is an invasion by the Russian state. This is absolutely clear. Sometimes I try not to specify, so as not to offend, but rather to condemn in general, although it is well known who I condemn. It is not necessary that I indicate my first and last name,” the pontiff replied.
In Buryatia located residence of Pandito Khambo Lama Damba Ayusheev, head of the Buddhist Traditional Sangha of Russia. Ayusheev replied to the pope that the Buryats are not cruel, but are simply fighting fascism: “Unexpectedly and unexpectedly, the head of the world’s Catholics was forced to speak unkind words about our people. I think it is not clear to European Latins that living in cold Siberia and the Far East makes people more resilient, patient and resilient to various adversities. Therefore, our people are not cruel, they are simply forced to defend their Motherland from fascism again and with dignity, like our grandfathers and great-grandfathers.”
The artist recalled numerous scandals around sexual harassment and child molestation. For example, the BBC publication, citing a statement by the head of the independent commission to investigate sexual abuse in the church, Jean-Marc Sauvé reported, that there have been thousands of pedophile priests operating in the French Catholic Church since the 1950s. And in CNN, citing a study by the Westphalian Wilhelm University wrotethat between 1945 and 2020 Catholic priests sexually abused more than 600 children in the diocese of the city of Münster.
What about the cover itself?
It indicates in the upper left corner that this is a special issue (numéro spécial) of Charlie Hebdo for November 30, 2022, number 1585. According to what has already become classic algorithm, we checked the official accounts of the French publication in Twitter, Facebook* And Instagram* and also archive covers on the magazine's website and did not find a viral caricature of the pontiff there. The last time the special was released, according to the website, went out June 1, 2022 and was number 101. In addition, in the picture in the lower right corner you can see the artist’s signature (Coco), however in the archive indicatedthat the last covers with her works were published at the end of 2020.
We were unable to pinpoint the original source of the image and its author, but the earliest Telegram post we found was appeared November 30 at 11:51 Moscow time in the “Putin on Telegram” channel (204,000 views). Previously, we have repeatedly refuted posts with fake covers, and the “Putin on Telegram” channel was mentioned in at least three of our texts. Thus, it featured at least two fake Charlie Hebdo covers (you can read our analysis here And here) and one cover of a Spanish magazine El Jueves.
I would like to note that the authors of the fake were confused not only with the issue numbers, but also with the numbers on the barcode. The fact is that all standard issues (at least for the last couple of years) are issued with the following code: L 14057, after which the serial number of the magazine is indicated. Special issue for June 1 under number 101 came out with a different code: L 17148 - 1H. The fake got something in between: L 17158 - 1585.
The real cover of Charlie Hebdo for November 30th posted on the publication’s social networks on November 29. She has nothing to do with the Pope and was numbered 1584, not 1585. On the Charlie Hebdo YouTube channel you can even look animated version of this cover. Because this weekly magazine, the original 1585th issue is not scheduled to go on sale until December 7th.
Turkish LeMan magazine
A Turkish cartoon related to the Pope began going viral on December 1, the day after the fake Charlie Hebdo cover appeared. In the drawing, the pontiff points his finger at a man in a Chechen national costume and says (translation from Turkish taken from a viral publication): “Chechens! Real knackers! Not like us! At the same time, on one side of Francis stand a Nazi, a crusader knight, as well as a priest with a child (apparently, this is another hint at scandals surrounding child molestation). Behind the pope a seemingly burnt body can be seen, which probably refers to the burning of heretics or women accused of witchcraft.
Posts with this cover can be found in Telegram channels "Solovyov"(217,000 views at the time of writing), "Ostashko! Important"(94,000), "Gasparyan"(283,000), "Before everyone else. Well almost. Special operation" (11,000) and "Polite people of SVO"(66,000). In addition to the public pages of TV presenters Ruslana Ostashko And Vladimir Solovyov, the cover appeared in small communities on VKontakte (examples here, here And here) and on users’ personal pages (here, here And here).
We have already given a quote from the pope about the cruelty of the Chechens above. Head of the Chechen Republic Razman Kadyrov on his Telegram channel criticized head of the Catholic Church, calling Francis "a victim of propaganda and the insistence of foreign media." Kadyrov reminded him about the Inquisition and the Crusades, which is reflected on the cover, about the multinational composition of the Russian Federation and told him what, in his opinion, guides every Chechen: “This is Islam. We do not start a battle without offering peace, as our prophet Muhammad did. And we've done this since the beginning of the SVO, probably dozens of times. <…> Moreover, every Muslim knows that an enemy who has pronounced shahadah (recognition of Allah as the only God) cannot be finished off or shown hatred towards him as an enemy. And the one who has repented must be completely forgiven.”
The supposedly Turkish cover with a Chechen and a pope indicates that this is No. 1604, released on December 1, 2022 (allegedly the 47th issue since the beginning of the year). Like Charlie Hebdo, LeMan is weekly. Previously we wrote, that Nos. 1592 (36), 1593 (37), 1594 (38) and 1595 (39) came out on September 14, 21, 28 and October 5, 2022, respectively. It follows from this that the latest issues go on sale at Wednesdays, and December 1 is Thursday.
We checked the main social networks of the Turkish magazine (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram) and did not find a viral cover in them. At the moment, the last magazine posted there is listed under No. 1603, and it was released on November 30, it has two covers (first And second) and it is also marked as the 47th release since the beginning of the year. It turns out that the 1604th issue of the weekly magazine was allegedly published just a day after the previous one - 1603rd. We found exactly the same discrepancy when wrote about another fake LeMan cover, only there the authors of the deception did not forget to change the issue number from the beginning of the year.
This time the earliest publication we found in Telegram appeared December 1 at 10:52 Moscow time in the “Bullet” channel (104,000 views), which was mentioned in our analyzes at least five times. There were at least three fake Charlie Hebdo covers posted there (here, here And here), as well as cartoons from a Spanish magazine El Jueves and German Titanic. The real issue of LeMan, number 1604 (48), should be released only on December 7, along with the latest Charlie Hebdo.
*Russian authorities think Meta Platforms Inc., which owns the social networks Facebook and Instagram, is an extremist organization; its activities in Russia are prohibited.
Cover photo: collage “Verified” / social networks
Fake
- Is it true that Pope Francis promised €200 to every Russian who celebrates Christmas on December 25?
- Is it true that the Pope declared refusal to vaccinate a mortal sin?
- Is it true that 3D graffiti with Zelensky eating money appeared in Poland?
- Is it true that KFC and Booking.com placed advertisements in Germany about “chicks from Ukraine”?
- Is it true that in the Czech Republic signs “No entry to Ukrainians” appeared on stores?
If you find a spelling or grammatical error, please let us know by highlighting the error text and clicking Ctrl+Enter.
