Original article (in Bosnian) was published on 14/09/2023; Author: Marija Ćosić
A filmed confrontation between two groups of men, one of whom was holding a Ukrainian flag, was incorrectly presented as an incident in which Ukrainian refugees beat up Poles in Warsaw.
On August 26, 2023, a video showing a conflict between a group of young men was published on Facebook The video was published with a description stating:
Ukrainian refugees beat Poles in Warsaw who refused to shout “Glory to Ukraine”
On August 26, 2023, the same video was published on Facebook thus featuring claims that the cause of the conflict was that the Poles refused “to return the Nazi salute”. On August 27, 2023, it appeared on one Telegram channel. The Telegram post states that the clash took place in Warsaw on August 24, the Independence Day of Ukraine.
Ukrainian refugees beat Poles in Warsaw because they refused to shout Nazi slogans
On August 24, the Independence Day of Ukraine, 12 Ukrainians jammed with 8 Poles asking them to shout the slogan. The Poles refused, stressing that “it is not important to them”.
One of the Poles suggested the Ukrainians to shout “Glory to Poland”, but they also refused, after which a fight broke out.
The 43-second video shows a group of men clashing verbally and then physically. One of the men in the video is holding the flag of Ukraine.
Due to the poor quality of the audio, it is not possible to reliably state what exactly the men on the recording are saying. However, on several occasions, it can be clearly seen that different people are saying the slogan “Glory to Ukraine”.
What are the facts?
Claims that the video shows an attack of Ukrainian refugees on a group of Poles were also shared in other languages. They were analyzed by fact-checking platforms from other countries, including Germany’s Correctiv, Ukraine’s StopFake, and the Polish and Serbian editions of AFP (1, 2). As all the mentioned platforms have established, official sources confirm that these claims are not true.
Ukraine’s Independence Day is celebrated on August 24, the date Ukraine declared its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. This year, in addition to the 32nd year of independence, August 24 also marked 18 months since the beginning of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. On this occasion, rallies in support of Ukraine were held in several countries around the world.
On that day, two groups of men really clashed in Warsaw. As it was announced on the official website of the police department in Warsaw on August 26, 2023, on the night between August 24 and 25, an incident occurred on Vistula boulevards. The police, it is stated, came to the scene a few minutes after receiving a report related to an aggressive group of men. As it is pointed out, 13 men were identified as part of the attacking group, none of whom were citizens of Ukraine. According to the police statement, the men were Georgians. They also state that no one needed emergency medical help and that no one filed a report related to this event. The part of the police statement that refers to the “video from social networks” confirms that the video really shows this conflict, as well as states that, in accordance with it, a procedure has been initiated in this administration.
In its analysis, the Correctiv fact-checking platform also points out that the Warsaw Public Prosecutor’s Office confirmed for this platform that the attackers were of Georgian nationality and that the motive for the attack was not confirmed.
AFP also notes that numerous media, including those from Poland (1, 2), have already pointed out that the video does not show “an attack by Ukrainian refugees”. In the analysis, it was also stated that it was not possible to find anyone “that would indicate a different context in which this video was created”. Even a search for the claim that Ukrainian refugees attacked Poles on August 24, 2023, in the Polish language does not yield credible results that would confirm that such a thing happened.
So, the claims that Ukrainian refugees “beat the Poles” in Warsaw because they refused to say “Glory to Ukraine” are incorrect. According to the police, the attackers were Georgians, and the motive for the attack has not been officially determined.
Is “Glory to Ukraine” a Nazi salute?
In some posts, it is stade that the greeting “Glory to Ukraine” is a Nazi slogan. Raskirnkavanje dealt with these claims in the analysis published on May 20, 2022, which you can read here. As explained in detail in this analysis, when it comes to the use of this greeting throughout history, decades ago it was indeed used as a greeting by nationalists or Nazi sympathizers. However, in a modern context, its use is far from Nazism. The claim that it was a Nazi salute is part of a narrative justifying the invasion by alleged widespread Nazism in Ukraine.
The narrative that attempts to present Ukrainian refugees as aggressive or ungrateful is a frequent motif of Russian propaganda. Numerous “evidences” used to support this narrative have been analyzed by various fact-checking platforms around the world and in a large number of cases found to be completely fake (1, 2, 3).
According to the facts, we evaluate the first publication of the claim that “Ukrainian refugees beat the Poles in Warsaw” because they refused to return the “Nazi slogan”, published with a video of the incident, as fake news. Other posts of the same claim are rated as the distribution of fake news.