News sites have taken recent polling data about Ukrainian refugees in Poland and distorted the findings to form a completely wrong conclusion. Among the surveys conducted of Ukrainian refugees in Poland, only 17% said they plan to stay in Poland.
Two videos have been viewed over a million times in social media posts that claim they show an Indonesian flag flown during a concert by German rock band Scorpions after Indonesian President Joko Widodo visited Ukraine and Russia to urge peace talks in late June 2022. The claim is false; the videos were taken during a Scorpions concert in Poland on May 28, 2022. News reports say the Polish and Ukrainian flags had been flown at the concert, not the Indonesian flag.
Since the start of the war in Ukraine, over 7 million people have fled the country. Multiple reports have outlined the specific difficulties that African refugees faced as they attempted to cross the Polish border and enter the European Union. Georgina Robertson and Sophie Samaille take a look at a Facebook post falsely claiming that refugees from Africa were shot at by Polish police.
Multiple social media posts in China have shared a video alongside a claim it shows the Polish president declaring military mobilisation in support of Ukraine. Although Poland sent weapons aid to Ukraine after Russia's invasion, misleading Chinese-language subtitles have been added to the clip to suggest it was sending troops to war. The Polish defence ministry dismissed the claim. As of May 26, AFP found no official reports that Poland was sending troops to Ukraine.
A photo of a couple embracing while draped in both the Russian and Ukrainian flags has circulated online after Moscow's invasion of its pro-Western neighbour alongside a claim it shows "love during [the] war". The image -- which was shared repeatedly in posts linking it to the war in Ukraine -- has circulated in reports since 2019 about a couple embracing at a concert in Poland.
A video has been viewed millions of times online alongside a claim it shows a young Ukrainian boy crying helplessly after fleeing to neighbouring Poland "alone". This is misleading. Reuters news agency, which filmed the footage, told AFP that the boy was seen walking behind his mother in the second half of the video. The Polish Border Guard separately clarified that the boy was "with his family" when he crossed into Poland.
Social media posts claim that three NATO countries will give 70 warplanes to Ukraine to aid the fight against invading Russian forces. This is misleading; while Kyiv said Poland, Bulgaria and Slovakia would provide the aircraft, officials from all three countries denied that they would do so.
False and misleading information about the Russian invasion of Ukraine has spread rapidly on social media since Russian forces launched a military assault in the pre-dawn hours of Feb. 24.
Here’s a roundup of claims related to the Ukraine-Russia conflict analyzed by the USA TODAY Fact Check team.
