By: Umme Kulsum
April 17 2023
Viral video claiming Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was seen using cocaine is digitally altered
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Fact-Check
The Verdict False
A video of Zelenskyy on a conference call with Twitter CEO Elon Musk has been doctored to show that the Ukrainian President was consuming cocaine.
Context
A digitally manipulated video of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has gone viral on social media. The video shows the Ukrainian president on a video call with Tesla CEO Elon Musk with what appears to be white powder and a gold credit card placed on the desk in front of him. Some social media users claim that the white powder is cocaine and that Zelenskyy consumes drugs.
However, analysis shows that the video has been manipulated and digitally altered. The doctored video went viral in 2022 with a similar misleading caption but has resurfaced again recently.
In Fact
A reverse image search led us to the original video posted on President Zelenskyy's official Instagram account on March 5, 2022. The footage clearly shows that there is no white powder present on Zelenskyy's desk as he attends the conference call.
In the original footage, posted by multiple news agencies including the BBC and the Guardian, there are no signs of any white powder or a credit card on the desk. According to the reports, Zelenskyy was on a call with Musk, thanking him for equipping the country with Starlink technology, which could secure internet access during the Russian invasion.
Since the beginning of the Russian war in Ukraine, misinformation about Zelenskyy and false claims of him being a drug addict has frequently circulated on social media. According to a report by the Associated Press, Putin and Russian State media have spread a false narrative that erroneously labels Ukrainian officials as “Nazis” and “drug addicts” in an effort to tarnish their reputations.
In 2022, Logically Facts also debunked another video that appeared to show Zelenskyy to be consuming drugs.
Verdict
Original video footage shows that a video from 2022 of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelinskyy on a video call with Elon Musk has been digitally manipulated to suggest that Zelenskyy consumes cocaine. Therefore, we have marked this claim as false.
