In May 2023, two covers of foreign publications with cartoons on the topic of the impending Ukrainian counter-offensive were distributed on the Internet. We found out if these are real covers.
French magazine Courrier International
On May 24, 2023, the cover of the Courrier International publication appeared on the Internet. The headline on it reads: “Ukrainian counter-offensive on the River Styx” (one of the rivers in the kingdom of the dead from ancient Greek mythology - Ed.). The drawing depicts Ukrainian military personnel under national flags, being carried in a boat by Charon; in the foreground is a caricature of the Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Valeriy Zaluzhny. Rumors Russian Telegram channels and media spread information about his serious injury or even death throughout May. Ukrainian authorities and the media, in turn, claimthat Zaluzhny is alive and well. The allegedly existing cover of the French edition was reported, in particular, by Telegram channels “Before everyone else. Well almost. Special operation"(291 thousand views at the time of publication), "SOLOVIEV"(245 thousand) and "Pool N3"(100 thousand). Some Telegram channels, however, called this drawing a “Special fake cover”, but continued to distribute it.
Courrier International is a weekly magazine published on Thursdays, with a digital version appearing a day earlier. The image being distributed states in two places (to the right of the title and in the lower left corner above the barcode) that this is supposedly #1700, a May 2023 special issue. In the archive of the publication there is an issue with this number, but it has a different cover, and the theme of the issue is inheritance as a social phenomenon.
In addition, this issue is dated June 1, that is, it came out a week after the cover with Styx appeared on the Internet. Became available to subscribers on May 24 No. 1699, but it also had a completely different cover, illustrating the headline “What if pizza is not Italian food?” Courrier International's only special issue for May released May 17 and was also dedicated to food. There are no traces of images with Ukrainian soldiers on the magazine’s social networks: in Twitter, Instagram And Facebook.
Some technical details also indicate that the cover with the Ukrainian military is fake. On the image being distributed, the number 031183 is indicated on the barcode. On the real covers of Courrier International, the number 03183 is used. This mistake was made by the authors of an already published fake cartoon from this publication - in April, Verified cover, in which Vladimir Zelensky allegedly took Easter eggs from children with the words “Ukraine needs it more!”
We were able to find the earliest mention of a fake cover in the Telegram channel “TeleDNO"(23 thousand views), where a post with this image was published on May 24 at 15:22 Moscow time. At 15:51 the cover appeared in the Telegram channel “Before everyone else. Well almost. Special operation", through which it received the greatest distribution (291 thousand views).
Spanish magazine El Jueves
On May 30, another viral image appeared on the same topic, this time allegedly the cover of the Spanish satirical magazine El Jueves. In the cartoon, worms are gnawing at human bones, one of them says: “What counter-offensive? We still haven’t finished eating after the previous one.” One of the skulls is wearing a helmet with a Ukrainian flag, from which it becomes clear that we are talking about Ukrainian soldiers. Posts with this image appeared in many popular Telegram channels, for example, Colonelcassad (352 thousand views), "Uncle Slava"(158 thousand) and "What happened?"(106 thousand).
The viral image shows the issue number - 2388. This number is in cover archive there is no magazine, the last issue that was published at the time of writing the analysis is No. 2387, and it is dedicated to artificial intelligence. The authors of the cartoon also used the same fake issue number (2388). last time, when they created an Easter cover about Zelensky and Ukrainians.
As with Courrier International, there are other technical details that indicate the cover is fake. In the lower left corner of the distributed image there is a barcode, above which the number 02375 is indicated on the right. On the actual covers of the Spanish satirical magazine, this number matches the issue number. Thus, if we were talking about No. 2388, then the number 02388 would appear above the barcode. The number 02375 is on the fake covers that have already been disassembled “Verified”, which were attributed to El Jueves, for example, in November 2022 (cover about a call from Russian pranksters to the Polish president) and in April 2023 (Easter cover about Zelensky). It is obvious that the authors of the fake either forget to change the numbers every time using the same template, or do it on purpose.
We were able to find the earliest mention of a fake cover in the Telegram channel “Before everyone else. Well almost. Special operation"(12 thousand views), where a post with this image was published on May 30 at 11:35 Moscow time. It is this channel that is most often the first to publish fake covers: for example, in mid-April there appeared fake covers of several European magazines.
Cover photo: collage “Verified” / social networks
Fake
- Is it true that foreign magazines published these covers dedicated to Zelensky and the Ukrainian church?
- Is it true that foreign magazines published these covers dedicated to Zelensky, Ukraine and Easter?
- Is it true that foreign magazines published these covers dedicated to Zelensky and Ukraine?
- Is it true that foreign magazines published these covers with cartoons dedicated to Zelensky, the Dalai Lama and Swiss banks?
- Is it true that a Spanish magazine published these covers with Zelensky and NATO leaders?
- Is it true that foreign satirical magazines published these covers dedicated to the words of the Pope about the Chechens and Buryats?
- Is it true that on three covers of Charlie Hebdo the President of Ukraine is depicted as a dog?
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