Such information was disseminated on social networks, in particular, on telegram channels broadcasting pro-Kremlin rhetoric. Reports say that graffiti with “anti-Ukrainian overtones” was painted on a residential building in Berlin. According to the authors of the fake message, graffiti depicting Volodymyr Zelenskyi eating the hand of a Ukrainian fighter. The hand itself is torn from the body and a Ukrainian chevron is depicted on it. And the inscription on Zelenskyi’s figure is cannibal. The authors refer to a number of German publications, in particular the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper and the national broadcaster Deutsche Welle, and add screenshots of supposedly news from the official pages of the publications. However, this is not true.

StopFake fact-checkers began to analyze this case and found out that such graffiti does not exist. But the German media did not come out with similar news and no mention of “Zelenskyi the cannibal” was found. Accordingly, propagandists used image editors to create images of graffiti. Experts also verified the authenticity of screenshots from fake publications - “news” on the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung website and “story” on the official Instagram account of Deutsche Welle with a photograph of graffiti. Thus, the compilation of photographs is indicated by numerous errors in the design of the German-language text. For example, propagandists wrote “Zelensky” and “Zelinsky”, although according to the German-Ukrainian transliteration the sound “z” is rendered by the letter “s”. Not all German-language publications adhere to these rules, but the Allgemeine Zeitung media workers use the “Selenskyi” form in their materials. On the contrary, Deutsche Welle resorts to international transliteration and is indicated as “Zelenskyy”. But they definitely don’t write like in the previous fake versions.

Regarding the publication of stories in Deutsche Welle, no information about “graffiti” was found on the website or other resources. It is most likely that this story was also made using Photoshop, since the same screenshot is constantly distributed in the Russian segment of social networks: this is indicated by the time of the probable publication of the story. All screenshots indicate that the stock was published 18 hours ago.

We have repeatedly refuted fake news related to fake graffiti or covers on foreign magazines/newspapers. Thus, propagandists seek to show that their rhetoric (for example, that Zelenskyi is hated by the whole world) is also repeated in the West. So it may seem to readers that the public is really dissatisfied with Ukraine. And especially when the authors use elements of popular culture, hinting that people are laughing at the situation in Ukraine and that the Ukrainian agenda for Europe is a reason to laugh.

Read the latest fakes on this topic, where Russia turns a blind eye to false works of street art and pop culture:

It’s as if in The Hague, the capital of European justice, they created graffiti depicting Zelenskyi hanging on the gallows. 

Or look at the fake cover of the allegedly British newspaper The New European, where the Ukrainian president was sitting on the lap of the Dalai Lama. 

And about the fake cover of the numb Volodymyr Zelenskyi from the figure of the dictator Putin and Jesus Christ, read here.