At the end of December 2022, Internet users circulated a photo of a boy “who survived a Russian artillery attack.” We have checked whether this description of this photo is correct.
On the evening of December 26, Deputy of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Lesya Vasilenko wrote on Twitter: “The saddest thing is: there are no more children in Ukraine, only little people with very adult, even old eyes, somewhat tired of a life not yet lived.” Attached to the tweet, which was seen by 2 million social network users in less than 24 hours, was a photograph presented by the parliamentarian as follows: “Mark, eight years old, just survived a Russian artillery attack.” The photograph was published with the same description in Facebook*, Telegram and other social networks.
By data UN, from February 24 to December 26, 2022, at least 429 children became victims of fighting in Ukraine, and another 800 were injured. The UN Human Rights Committee in its report emphasizes that “the actual figures are much higher, as information from some areas where intense fighting took place has been delayed and many reports are still awaiting confirmation.” In mid-December, BBC News Ukraine, citing local authorities reportedthat at least 1,128 Ukrainian children have become orphans since the start of the full-scale invasion.
At the same time, a photograph of eight-year-old Mark as a victim of Russian shelling, as found out fact checkers from India Today appears on the Internet not for the first time. For example, back in mid-April her published Instagram* account @orthodox_wisdom with the caption “So much pain in those little eyes! God, save these children, put an end to this unnecessary, ruthless war!” The post also contained the hashtags #ukraine and #ukrainewar.
However, this photo has nothing to do with the events of the last ten months. Back in 2013, the photo was posted on cover Spanish-language edition of Christine McKenna's novel The Misremembered Man. Moreover, as our Indian colleagues have established, this photograph of a crying boy is even older - back in March 2012, the image posted Flickr user (page currently unavailable).
At the same time, it is a mistake to call Vasilenko the first to claim that the photograph shows eight-year-old Mark from Ukraine suffering from Russian rocket fire. For example, 17 hours before the deputy, a photo published another Twitter user, she introduces herself as Irisha Vinnitskaya and posts several dozen and sometimes hundreds of tweets a day. The blogger attributes the following words to the child in the photo: “I’m not afraid to die, because I listen to my mother and help her more often than I play around. Therefore I will go to heaven. <…> I think that heaven is like Ukraine, where there is no war and where there is no Russia.”
Thus, the photograph used in Deputy Vasilenko’s tweet and in the publications of other Internet users does not depict a boy injured during a Russian missile attack on Ukrainian territory. Although the exact location of the shooting could not be determined, it is reliably known that this photograph was taken at least ten years ago and is not related to the fighting in Ukraine in 2022. After the first denials appeared, Vasilenko deleted the tweet about eight-year-old Mark.
*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: Twitter
Not true
- India Today. Fact Check: This boy is not a Russia-Ukraine war survivor, Ukrainian MP shares years old and unrelated photo
- Is it true that the photographs depict Ukrainian women participating in the filming of a fake about the victims of military operations?
- Is it true that the photo shows a wedding in Ukraine?
- Is it true that the photo shows Ukrainian refugees in Croatia?
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