The Polish television channel TVP, whose logo was used on a Russian fake showing a map of Poland that includes neighboring Ukrainian territories, denied they had ever used such a map during any of their programming. The screenshot used by Russian media was taken from a TVP weather forecast, a map was photoshopped with a new map and a presenter from another Polish television channel.
Russian Z Telegram channels, channels who use the letter Z in their account names, thereby showing their support for Russia’s war in Ukraine and loyalty to Vladimir Putin, are busy spreading another lie, claiming that Poland is encroaching on Ukrainian territories. To illustrate this disinformation narrative, they have invented a story that during their weather forecast, a Polish television channel used a map which shows western Ukrainian regions as part of Poland.
“Moscow has often warned about the aggressive intentions of Warsaw regarding Ukraine” the Russian newspaper Izvestia writes.
The propagandist publication Voyennoye obozrenie (Military Review) divides Ukraine even further in their version of this fake: “Poland believes that as a result of the Special Military Operation (Russia’s official name for its invading war in Ukraine) Russia will get the southeastern Russian speaking territories of Ukraine, Kyiv will keep the northern provinces, and Poland, Romania and Hungary will divide the western regions”.
Poland’s TVP channel, whose logo was used to create this fake, denied that this was one their stories.
“This is a fabricated story intended to convince the Russian public of the themes disseminated by Moscow. This story was never on TVP, our channel logo was simply attached” TVP said.
The weather forecast on TVP looks completely different from the screenshot disseminated by Russian media, the channel does use a map of Poland, without the territories of neighboring countries.
TVP also pointed out that to create their fake screenshot, Russian propagandists used the image of presenter Joanna Wysocka from another Polish television channel – Trwam. A search for weather forecasts on Trwam found a video with Wysocka wearing the same clothes as in the Russian fake. In the original video, which was aired on March 27, 2020, the presenter talks about the weather in Poland against the backdrop of a completely different map.
In an article in Wirtualnemedia, Poland’s largest media, internet, advertising and marketing portal, Poland’s government Commissioner for Information Security Stanisław Żaryn points out that the Kremlin’s information activities are still focused on three vectors: portraying Ukraine and Ukrainians as disgusting, portraying support for Ukraine as an escalation factor and to frighten with the idea of Poland entering the war and the possible consequences of such a move.
StopFake has debunked another fake involving Poland, a story claiming that more than a thousand Polish mercenaries have died since the start of Russia’s war against Ukraine.
