Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Ishaq Dar, arrived in Dhaka on August 23rd for a two-day visit. In this context, starting from at least the night of August 23rd, a video containing the sound of gunfire has been circulated on social media with the claim: “Right now, a mutiny is underway in Savar Cantonment among the army in protest of the Pakistani Foreign Minister’s visit. A massive clash is ongoing between the patriotic army and the children of collaborators… Remove Yunus, save Bangladesh. The sellout media will not report this.”
See posts circulated on Facebook with this claim here (archive), here (archive), and here (archive).
As of the publication of this report, the aforementioned videos have been viewed a combined total of over 30,000 times.
See a post circulated on Instagram with this claim here (archive).
Fact-check
An investigation by the Rumor Scanner team found that there has been no mutiny in the army in protest of the visit of Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Ishaq Dar. In reality, the video circulated with the claim has been available online since at least last September, claiming to show a shooting incident in the Chattogram Hill Tracts.
Through a reverse image search of several keyframes from the video, a post was found on a Facebook account named ‘Kamrul Hasan’ dated September 20th of last year. A comparison of this video with the one being circulated shows they are identical.
The caption of the video reads, “The hills are restless again | Clash between two sides in Khagrachari, shops and houses set on fire. Widespread sounds of gunfire in Dighinala, Khagrachari, late at night. The number of army camps in the hills should be increased again to manage the situation. May peace return to the hills through the army’s intervention. May all the peace-loving people of the hill districts stay well.”
Furthermore, the investigation revealed that the video was posted between September 19th and 21st of last year from various social media accounts with the claim that it was an incident in the Chattogram Hill Tracts.
A relevant keyword search led to a report published on the website of the national daily Prothom Alo on September 20th of the previous year. It stated, “Following a clash between hill people and Bengalis in Dighinala of Khagrachari district, a shooting incident occurred throughout the night yesterday, Thursday (September 19), in the district headquarters. Panic has spread throughout the district, including the headquarters. Three people were killed and at least 15 were injured in the night’s shooting and the afternoon’s clash.”
However, while the exact origin or context of the video could not be fully confirmed, it is certain that the video is not recent and is not related to the Pakistani Foreign Minister’s visit to Bangladesh.
Therefore, a video that is at least 11 months old has been circulated with the false claim that it shows an army mutiny in protest of the visit of Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Ishaq Dar; which is false.
Sources
- Kamrul Hasan – Facebook Post
- Md Sayful Islam – Facebook Post
- Bangladesh Pratidin – ১৩ বছর পর ঢাকায় পাকিস্তানের পররাষ্ট্রমন্ত্রী (Pakistan’s Foreign Minister in Dhaka after 13 years)
- Rumor Scanner’s analysis
