DISINFO: Emmanuel Macron cancelled his trip to Ukraine because of an assassination plot
SUMMARY
French President Macron was supposed to be assassinated during his visit to Ukraine as a sacrificial victim. The plan was elaborated by Kirill Budanov, with the approval of Volodymyr Zelensky. The Kiev junta's plan had several stages: "Macron dies, we blame Russia, NATO goes to war with Russia, we are saved." But Macron was saved by Valerii Zaluzhnyi, who alerted the French presidency and the trip was cancelled.
French media France 24 published this information before withdrawing the video from its site. The French president is very scared that he soon becomes a sacrificial victim and the pretext for a war against Russia.
RESPONSE
Disinformation targeting Ukraine and the French President.
No material evidence or testimony lends credibility to this rumor and related video material has been proven to be deepfakes.
Ukraine, being a nation on the path to EU membership accession, adheres to principles of the rule of law. Such a narrative only serves to propagate the notion that Ukraine could be considered a terrorist state. The deepfake video, falsely attributed to France 24 and shared on X/Twitter, seeks to lend credibility to the rumour. However, it merely exposes the malevolent intent behind the disinformation campaign.
The video that is circulating has been identified as a deepfake by France 24. Although the footage may indeed be an authentic excerpt from a news broadcast by the channel, the voice of the presenter has been altered to make him utter words he never said. Furthermore, the syntax and approximate grammar evident in the video were quite obvious clues, as noted by 20 min.
The reposting of the rumour by former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has increased the visibility of an anonymous rumour, but not its credibility. Indeed, he has recently amplified several disinformation campaigns, employing aggressive hate speech against Europeans, Americans and Ukrainians.
The French presidency has denied this rumour and denounced it as fakenews.
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