Propagandists broadcasting pro-Russian rhetoric on social networks and the media are distributing a video that allegedly depicts the murder of a Ukrainian recruiting officer while delivering a draft notice. They say that this footage was “shared by the National Police of Ukraine”. They add that this can be considered “the beginning of the civil war in Ukraine”. It's fake.

Specialists from the StopFake project drew attention to it. They found out that the video being distributed did not indicate where this incident occurred, which the territorial center of recruitment and social support was being referred to, or when it happened. Such propaganda methods are used specifically to make it more difficult to identify the video and verify its authenticity. Also, the video itself is of very low quality, trimmed (consisting of 2 seconds) - this method is also often used to make it impossible to prove the falsity of the message.

The StopFake specialists also checked the official communication channels of the National Police in recent days and found neither the publication of this video nor information about the murder of a territorial center of recruitment and social support representative. This also indicates that the information being disseminated is fake.

Shortly after the appearance of this dubious video, the National Police published a refutation explaining what exactly it indicated forgery: “the published fragment of the video does not reflect signs characteristic of a shot from a firearm; the inscriptions on the vest of the person in the video are illegible, probably written in foreign letters, and employees of the territorial center of recruitment and social support, while on duty, wear camouflage clothing and without reflective vests; The “watermark” on the video is a fake of the Ukraine National Police mark and does not correspond to how the official video is marked. In addition, the National Police noted that they had not received any reports of the murder or injury of a territorial center of recruitment and social support employee.

By spreading such fakes, propagandists want to show that public outrage in Ukraine supposedly goes beyond limits. Russian propaganda often uses the topic of mobilization in Ukraine to create fakes and manipulations. Detector Media has repeatedly refuted them.