In March 2024, a fragment of a British TV channel broadcast went viral on social networks, in which the presenters allegedly laugh and share their plans for the weekend. At this time, a photograph from the funeral of a Russian oppositionist is shown on the screen behind them. We verified the veracity of the viral video.
No later than March 13, they began to appear on RuNet. publications such content (punctuation and spelling preserved): “BBC presenters laugh cheerfully and discuss plans for the weekend, against the backdrop of a photo from Navalny’s grave, a minute after they tragically finished suffering, remembering Navalny.” At the same time, the authors provide a video with the British Broadcasting Corporation logo, in which two women are actually having fun when a photo of a deceased politician is shown on the big screen behind them. Sometimes TBC, that before that a story about Navalny’s funeral was shown on air.
According to the TGStat service, about a hundred similar posts appeared on Telegram, with a total of about 1 million views. Such posts are published in the channels "Ne.Sugar"(279,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Uncle Slava" (174,000), "Evil proof️"(160,000), "Z-News | Army 🅉 18+"(109,000), "Ax | Policy"(36,000), "Partisans"(30,000), "Thoughts Okhlobystin"(22,000) and many smaller ones (examples here, here And here). The video was also posted in "VKontakte", V social networks X, on YouTube and news websites.
February 16, 2024 Department of the Federal Penitentiary Service of the Russian Federation for the Yamalo-Nenets District reported about the death of Alexei Navalny in the colony. Over the course of several days, thousands of people in cities around the world took part in rallies in memory of the leader of the Russian opposition. Funeral of a politician took place at the Borisov cemetery in Moscow on March 1.
As stated in the above-mentioned posts, the BBC aired a photo from the burial ceremony, but using a reverse image search, “Verified” found out that the photo used was taken earlier and not in Russia. Its author is an agency reporter Associated Press Ebrahim Norouzi, this photograph shows a spontaneous memorial in front of the Russian Embassy in Berlin on February 16.
The viral video lasts only 20 seconds, is distributed with Russian subtitles and is not an independent fragment of a television broadcast, but a recording of the TV screen made on a smartphone. At the same time, the video contains the BBC News logo, and a splash screen is shown at the end BBC North West - a unit broadcasting in the north-west of England. In the video, the following dialogue takes place between the presenters:
- Thank you very much. So, what are your plans for the weekend? Anything interesting?
- Oh, a surprise party for my niece.
- Oh, how sweet!
- Yeah, it'll be a lot of fun.
“But it won’t be a surprise if she’s watching us.”
- My God, I spoiled the surprise! (Laughs.) Shhh!
- So, bye everyone!
"Verified" studied account BBC North West on social media X found the original 31-second recording posted on February 17, 2024. IN post mentioned the evening newscast, and in another tweet clarifiedthat a funny situation happened on air the day before. The video was accompanied by the following text from the presenter: Annabelle Tiffin: "Kaser Quamer, Don't worry. Only a few hundred thousand people watch the live broadcast on TV, but millions more saw it here on X! Happy birthday to your niece!”
This recording of the broadcast shows that Kaumer was conducting a weather forecast in the UK, and immediately after that she went to the part of the studio where Tiffin was sitting on the sofa. The following is a fragment that became viral on the RuNet. Moreover, in the original, one of the screens behind the presenters shows not a photo of the memorial in memory of Navalny, but a panorama of the evening street. Moreover, both screens form a single image with an animated show logo North West Tonight.
The excerpt with the clause about the surprise party actually went viral on the Internet. For example, one from tweets with the video received almost 470,000 views, and another - 1.9 million. This video is also horrible to popular TV show Jimmy Kimmel. At the same time, the recording was not shown anywhere with Navalny’s photo on the screen.
As for the party itself, later the host spokethat her accidental mistake didn't spoil it surprise. Even though the birthday girl I looked viral video, she thought it was about Kaumer's other niece, since both girls were born in one day.
Thus, the unknowns (in another times) fabricated a video on behalf of the BBC. They used a video that had circulated on the English-language segment of the Internet a month earlier and changed the image on the screen, superimposing a photograph of a spontaneous memorial in Berlin in memory of the Russian oppositionist.
Cover photo: social networks
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