World Cup and Russian fakes

Russian propaganda forged the Qatar Football Association's appeal to Ukraine

Russian Telegram channels are spreading the fabricated appeal of the Qatar Football Association to Ukraine, driven by Zelensky's video address blocked by FIFA ahead of the World Cup finals. The publication, which was allegedly released on the official Twitter account of the Qatar Football Association, reads: if Ukraine is offended by the ban, it may withdraw from FIFA, and politics should be kept out of sports.

The screenshot in the publication is fake, although a reverse Google search of the image does lead to the Qatar Football Association's official Twitter account.

It has a publication with a picture of the Morocco national team which was used by the Russians. But the original publication has a completely different text which has no relation to Ukraine. In the original publication, the Qatar Football Association praises the Morocco team which showed good results in the tournament.

In addition, the publication that actually exists on the official Qatar Football Association Twitter account and the forged screenshot have about the same number of likes, shares, and comments. This means that Russian propaganda used a screenshot of the original publication and changed the text to their own.

The tags in the original and fabricated publications are also identical. In both cases, the official Twitter accounts of FIFA and the Morocco national football team were tagged.

By the way, as it became known from the official statement by the President’s Office, Qatar did not oppose Zelensky's video address, and the decision was made by FIFA.

"Qatar supported the President’s initiative, but FIFA blocked the initiative and will not allow the video address of the president to be shown before the final game," the President’s Office told CNN.

Russian propaganda often uses foreign platforms to create fakes. Ukrinform analyzed one of the latest examples, also related to the World Cup in Qatar, here.

Dmytro Badrak