At the end of July 2023, covers of Charlie Hebdo and Ananda Vikatan appeared on the Internet, ridiculing fencer Olga Kharlan and Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky. We decided to check if these are real covers.
French magazine Charlie Hebdo
On July 29, a cover of the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo began circulating online. The drawing depicts two fencers: one extends her hand, the other, presented as deliberately ugly, brandishes a weapon. The caption reads: “The real pride of your country.” This cover appeared two days after ended in scandal fight at the World Fencing Championship between Ukrainian saber fencer Olga Kharlan and Russian Anna Smirnova, who competed under a neutral flag. Harlan won, but did not shake her opponent’s hand, instead holding her saber forward. As a result, the result of the fight was upheld, but Harlan was disqualified for refusing a handshake, which is mandatory according to the rules (the International Fencing Federation subsequently suspended this decision). The allegedly new cover of Charlie Hebdo was reported, for example, by Telegram channels “Ne.Sugar"(280,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Putin on Telegram"(184,000), "Mriya" (176,000) and "Sheikh Tamir"(132,000). The image was also posted on the Telegram channel RT TV channel (120,000), who later deleted the post.
In the lower left corner of the image being distributed it is stated that it is #1619 dated August 2, 2023. According to the archive on the magazine’s official website, the most recent issue that had been published by that time was issue No. 1618, dated July 26. Charlie Hebdo is traditionally released digitally on Wednesdays and in print on newsstands on Thursdays. That is, the new issue, indeed, was supposed to be released on August 2 under number 1619, but the magazine does not announce its covers that early.
The latest issue of Charlie Hebdo, available when the cover was first published, was devoted to a completely different topic, namely - polemics around the decision of a court in Marseille to place under arrest a policeman accused of beating protester during the riots in early July. In this drawing, a policeman hangs a judge from a tree and says: “Let us work!”
Unlike previous fake covers (such as fake nos. 1603, 1605 And 1614), the authors of this viral image tried to make their drawing look as believable as possible: there is no “special number” mark or technical errors in the barcode. This time, above the title of the magazine there are even announcements of materials inside the issue.
However, the last detail allows us to confidently say that this is a fake. The font of these announcements, although vaguely similar to the original one, is different from it. This is especially noticeable in the example of identical combinations of letters, for example in the words parents and Paris.
In addition, the fake cover bears the signature of the artist Pierrick Juin in the lower right corner. But in gallery There are no such caricatures in the drawings of this regular Charlie Hebdo contributor, and in general his drawings are made in a different style.
The original source of the fake cover was the Telegram channel “Before everyone else. Well almost. Special operation", where the post with the cover appeared on July 29 at 10:01 Moscow time (10,000 views). It is in this channel that fake covers of foreign magazines and newspapers most often appear - in 25 cases out of 45 that became the subject of analysis by Verified.
Indian magazine Ananda Vikatan
On July 29, the cover of Ananda Vikatan magazine appeared online. It depicts Vladimir Zelensky in the image of Gollum, a character from Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy, and actor Elijah Wood, who played the main character in the film adaptation of the series of novels. Zelensky is holding syringes, packages of pills and a device for smoking marijuana. The inscription in Tamil reads: “No ring can hide the truth.” This cover was reported, in particular, by Telegram channels “Gasparyan"(56,000), "Ukr Leaks" (21,000) and "Olesya Loseva"(12,000).
The top right corner of the cover being distributed states that the issue is August 2, 2023. Like Charlie Hebdo, Ananda Vikatan is published once a week: July 2023 four issues have been published, the August 2 issue is already available on the website. The magazine did not publish covers with Zelensky either in July or August, and the real issue for August 2 looks different.
Above the magazine's title on the cover it distributes is written "Volume 98, Special Issue". The volume number is a continuous numbering that corresponds to the 98th year of Ananda Vikatan. However, the Indian publication has not had any special issues in recent months.
It is characteristic that the plot depicted on the distributed cover refers to another fake - treatment, which Elijah Wood allegedly recorded for Zelensky. On July 20, a video was circulated on Russian Telegram channels in which the actor expresses support for a certain Vladimir (he is referred to only by his first name), who is addicted to drugs and alcohol. As Verified already wrote, the authors of the fake used a service where you can order a personal video for fans, and then created a fake account for the actor on Instagram, through which they distributed the video.
The primary source of the fake cover, as in the previous case, was the Telegram channel “Before everyone else. Well almost. Special operation", where the post with the cover appeared on July 29 at 10:01 Moscow time (10,000 views).
Cover photo: collage “Checked”
- 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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