Fact Check: This is not Russia preparing mass graves for its soldiers killed in Ukraine war
India Today
A video of long rows of dug graves is circulated on social media with the claim that it was prepared by the Russian government for their soldiers brought dead from Ukraine.
More than 150,000 troops are deployed by Russia as part of its war efforts in Ukraine. As per the American intelligence estimates, the invasion army has already lost over 7,000 personnel since the start of the war.
Amid this revelation by the media, a video of long rows of dug graves is circulated on social media with the claim that it was prepared by the Russian government for their soldiers brought dead from Ukraine.
One such post on Facebook that received over 270K views until the time of filing this story can be seen below.
India Today Anti Fake News War Room (AFWA) has found that the claim along with the video is misleading. This video has been on the internet at least since 2021. According to Russian authorities, it showed a common practice in the northern cities of Russia where graves are dug ahead of the winter.
AFWA probe
We did a reverse search of the keyframes of the viral video and found the same video shared by Russian social media handles at least since October 2021. This confirmed that the video is old and not related to the Russia-Ukraine war that started in February 2022.
Some netizens who posted the video in 2021 also claimed that the video is from Russia’s Surgut.
