February 9, 2022

False: the images don't show weapons captured at Raya front

HAQCHECK

HaqCheck inspected the images and rendered the images used to support the claim False.

Avatar: Kirubel Tesfaye
By Kirubel Tesfaye

Kirubel works as a fact-checker at Addis Zeybe for HaqCheck. He is interested in learning and expanding his writing and journalistic skills.

False: the images don't show weapons captured at Raya front

Telegram channel with more than a thousand subscribers shared a post on Feb 4, 2022, captioned, “weapons captured from TPLF forces at the Raya front.” By the time this article was published the post had more than 6700 views.

A post with the same caption was also shared on another Facebook page with more than 17 thousand followers. The Facebook post had more than 800 reactions and was shared more than 100 times. However, HaqCheck inspected the images and rendered them False.

The Tigray People Liberation Front (TPLF) and the Federal government of Ethiopia have been in an active war since Nov 2020. 

At the end of June 2021, the Federal government declared a sudden unilateral ceasefire and pulled out its troops from Tigray after a request from the Provisional Interim Government of the region. Thereafter, TPLF forces advanced southward to territories in the Amhara and the Afar Regions. 

After the federal government and regional forces launched a counteroffensive against TPLF, the Tigrayan forces started to retreat back to Tigray. Thereafter, the federal government announced that its armies will not advance deeper into Tigray and will stay on the borders of the Afar and Amhara regions. However, TPLF continued accusing the Amhara and Afar militias of attacking Tigray.

HaqCheck made an investigation on the images and spotted the pictures in a news video on Amhara media corporations’ Youtube channel published on Feb 2, 2022. By the time this article was published the video had more than 150 thousand views.

The first image is spotted  in the news video on its 23 minute and 05 seconds 


 

The second image is spotted in the news video on its 22 minutes and 57 seconds

The news video is headlined,  “In an operation undertaken by the defense forces and the federal police on the terrorist Shene, more than 100 members of it are eliminated"

The video also shows surrendered members of the claimed terrorist group. 

Therefore, HaqCheck inspected the images and rendered the images used to support the claim False.