At the end of June 2023, it was widely reported that a Swedish MP had taken the initiative to nominate an Iraqi immigrant who burned the Muslim holy book outside a mosque in Stockholm for a Nobel Committee award. We checked if this news is real.
June 28, 2023, at first day of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha, 37-year-old Iraqi refugee Salwan Momika tore and burned a copy of the Koran in the park near the main mosque of Stockholm. The police protected the action, although they initially refused to sanction it due to concerns of a threat to public order, but the court insisted on the legality of the event - in its opinion, the security risks were insufficient to restrict freedom of speech. Commenting on this decision, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson stated, which considers the high-profile event “legal but inappropriate.”
The next day, publications appeared on social networks and the media that Momika was allegedly nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, and the nomination was initiated by Swedish MP Andre Ovstegard. “This is recognition for all the people of Iraq who continue to fight for freedom” - this quote from the politician accompanies many of his posts. According to the TGStat service, at the time of writing this analysis, similar publications on Telegram received a total of more than 10 million views. The news appeared also in the channels “Ax 18+"(2 million views), Colonelcassad (334,000), "Media Russia is not Moscow"(291,000), "Observer"(256,000), "Putin on Telegram"(229,000), "Uncle Slava"(180,000), Voblya (177,000), "Sheikh Tamir" (139,000) and "What happened?"(123,000).
The authorities of Saudi Arabia, Iran, Morocco, Iraq and other countries of the Islamic world convicted event in Stockholm. In protest on June 29, Iraqis stormed Swedish Embassy in Baghdad. Many of the above-mentioned Telegram channels published videos from there, again mentioning the supposed initiative of the Swedish politician. Other channels that did the same include “Live broadcast"(806,000 views), "Russia now"(358,000), "Truthfulness"(237,000), "Bullet" (158,000) and "Yakov Kedmi"(88,000). Authors of the publication Readovka (831,000) believe that Ovstegard’s initiative was the “last straw” for the protesting Iraqis. They also talked about the alleged nomination of an Iraqi for the Nobel Peace Prize in the news release of Channel One (at the mark 18:32): “In Sweden, it’s as if they are deliberately continuing to add fuel to the fire - today there was a proposal to nominate the very same vandal who caused the provocation for the Nobel Prize.” In addition, the news can be found on the websites “Politicus" and TV channel "Crimea 24", as well as in "VKontakte" And Twitter.
MP André Ovstegard indeed exists (his full name is Freddy Andre Ovstegard), however, this is not a Swedish, but a Norwegian politician - he has been working in the local parliament since 2017. “Verified” was unable to find any of his statements about Momika’s nomination for the Nobel Prize in official and/or authoritative sources. Moreover, on June 29, the day the news appeared in the media and Telegram channels, Ovstegard told on his Facebook* that he went on vacation.
The earliest publication about Ovstegard’s initiative, along with his viral quote “Verified”, was found in the Telegram channel “but my Yandex wallet” - there is a post there appeared June 29, 2023 at 11:33 Moscow time and received 16,000 views. In the description of this channel emphasized the fictitious nature of all entries: “Parody, satire on political reality. Only verified fakes.”
When the joke began to spread, the author ridiculed some channels and publications where it was passed off as real news. For example, he commented on the post of the channel “Axe 18+” So: “O - efficiency”, and a fragment of the Channel One broadcast - So: “Add fuel to the fire.” When reports appeared about the storming of the Swedish embassy in Iraq, the creator of the channel “here is my Yandex wallet” wrote: “I hope it’s not because of me.” A little later, he shared a fragment of Readovka’s publication that the last straw for the Iraqis could have been the proposal of an alleged Swedish deputy, and commented it’s with the words: “Oh, that’s it.”
The satirical publication was probably based on real news from 2019. Then Ovstegard and two colleagues put forward Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg for the Nobel Peace Prize. Norwegian MP explained her decision because the girl united thousands of other schoolchildren in an effort to stop global climate change, and her initiatives make a great contribution to achieving world peace. Thunberg on Twitter called the nomination was an honor and thanked her for it. Moreover, even four years ago some media (for example, Sputnik) incorrectly called Ovstegard a Swedish deputy.
"Verified" dismantled There have already been more than a dozen cases when satirical news from “but my Yandex wallet” was passed off as real. It is noteworthy that we recently examined another fiction of this channel related to the burning - supposedly singer Charlotte complainedthat after destroying his Russian passport, he cannot leave Yerevan airport due to lack of documents.
Thus, the owners of the largest Russian-language Telegram channels and editors of Russian television programs once again did not find the original source of the satirical news, which did not stop them from talking about it as real to a multimillion-dollar audience.
*Russian authorities think Meta Platforms Inc., which owns the social network Facebook, is an extremist organization; its activities in Russia are prohibited.
Cover photo: “Verified” screenshot / video CRUX
- Did singer Charlotte complain that after burning his Russian passport he could not leave Yerevan airport?
- Is it true that Ray Bradbury got the temperature scales mixed up in the title of his novel Fahrenheit 451?
- Is it true that the Koran prohibits Muslims from drinking alcohol?
- Did Bradbury State: “There are worse crimes than burning books. For example, don’t read them?
- Is it true that Ramzan Kadyrov has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize?
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