Against the backdrop of Russia’s assault on Ukraine, a video is being circulated that shows two groups of people dressed in army uniforms, with one of the officers on one side holding a Ukrainian flag and a soldier from the other side holding a gun. It has been claimed that the video shows Ukrainian and Russian soldiers facing off in the ongoing conflict.
Twitter use Ikhlaque Siddiqui shared the clip with the same claim. It garnered more than 45,000 views as of this writing. (Archive link)
Ukrainian and Russian soldiers face to face.#Russia #Ukraine #USA #JoeBiden #VladimirPutin #Putin #Biden #WorldWar3 #WWIII #RussiaUkraineConflict pic.twitter.com/RXTLt12v9B
— Ikhlaq Siddiqui (@Miksiddiqui) February 24, 2022
Twitter handle ‘@z4iks’ also promoted the video, claiming that the Ukrainian army went to confront Russian troops without weapons. (Archive link)
No weapons in the Ukrainian army, meet face to face Russia and Ukraine armys pic.twitter.com/sLMayR9uJi
— 4b3_y (@z4iks) February 25, 2022
The visuals have been shared on Facebook and Twitter as recent.
Video from 2014
We performed a keyword search and came across a YouTube video posted by Channel 4 News in March 2014. Scenes from the viral visuals appear after the 1:03 mark in this report. It is mentioned that Ukrainian and Russian soldiers came face to face in Ukraine’s Belbek. Furthermore, Ukrainian troops marched up to the Russian-controlled Belbek Airbase in the territory of Crimea.
BBC News Turkey also covered the development in a video report dated March 4, 2014.
Reporting on the incident, the Irish Mirror stated that one soldier standing guard at the airbase in Crimea even threatened to shoot the legs of the 300 Ukrainian soldiers approaching their position.
To sum it up, an eight-year-old video of Ukrainian and Russian troops facing off was falsely circulated as visuals from the ongoing conflict.
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