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| - False: Chinese subtitles of Putin’s speech threatening Japan are fabricated
Videos allegedly showing Russian President Vladimir Putin issuing threats against Japan started to circulate in late September on Chinese social media platforms.
A 17-second video of Putin giving a speech in Russian was posted on Douyin on Sept. 26, with Chinese subtitles: 「首先，我先警告一下日本。小日本，请你不要那么狂。如果你还是那么嚣张，那么我可以让你从世界地图上消失，不要以为我在跟你开玩笑。」
Translated to English, the subtitles read: “First, I warn Japan. Little Japan, don’t be so arrogant. If you continue to be so cocky, I can make you disappear from the world map. Don’t think I’m kidding.”
The same video appeared on Douyin on Oct. 4. The two posts have racked up more than 100,000 likes and 22,100 shares, as well as over 2,500 comments.
Another video of Putin giving a speech on a different occasion was posted on WeChat in mid-November, and this 18-second clip also had identical Chinese subtitles.
However, the videos’ Chinese subtitles were completely fabricated and did not reflect what Putin actually said.
One video shows the Russian president talking about breaking the siege of Leningrad on its 80th anniversary in January 2023, while another clip shows him delivering a speech following the Moscow concert hall terrorist attack in March 2024.
Tensions among Japan, China, and Russia
On Sept. 23, Japan said it scrambled fighter jets and fired a flare after a Russian patrol aircraft entered its airspace three times. One month earlier, on Aug. 26, the country accused a Chinese spy plane of violating its airspace for the first time.
On Oct. 4, in his first keynote speech in parliament, Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba noted, “A series of intrusions by China and Russia into Japan’s territorial airspace has also occurred.”
While Russia denied the alleged breach, China admitted in mid-November that one of its planes entered Japan’s airspace but said it was unintentional.
The latest tension has drawn Chinese netizens’ attention to Japan’s relations with China and Russia.
Douyin video
Through a reverse image search, we found that the original video was posted on the official Kremlin website on Jan. 18, 2023. The 78-minute footage came with official transcripts in Russian and English.
“Vladimir Putin met with Great Patriotic War veterans, residents of besieged Leningrad and representatives of patriotic public associations at the State Memorial Museum of the Defence and Siege of Leningrad,” the video’s and the transcripts’ subheadlines said.
The “Great Patriotic War” is a term used in Russia to describe the World War II conflict fought on the Eastern Front from June 22, 1941, to May 8, 1945.
The January 2023 meeting was part of the 80th anniversary of breaking the siege of Leningrad, now St. Petersburg.
The Douyin clip was taken from the 12:25 to 12:42 marks of the original video.
As Putin emphasized the significance of preserving historical memory, he said, according to the English version of the official transcript:
“In fact, you know, I will say one unusual thing, although there is really nothing unusual about it. We have a natural protection mechanism. A person very quickly forgets the bad things; everything is forgotten very quickly. A new generation …”
WeChat video
For the second video, Annie Lab first consulted Wang Ruoxi, a Chinese postgraduate student studying Russian in Moscow, to translate Putin’s speech. We then identified keywords such as: “four perpetrators” and “the terrorist attack.”
A search on Google with those keywords found a video of Putin’s speech on the Kremlin website dated March 23, 2024. It shows him condemning a terrorist attack at a Moscow concert hall and vowing stronger anti-terrorism measures.
The video – which is five minutes and 26 seconds long – also came with official transcripts in Russian and English.
The WeChat clip matches the 2:13 and 2:31 marks of the original footage. According to the English transcript, Putin said:
“All four perpetrators, who were directly involved in the terrorist attack, all those who shot and killed people, have been found and apprehended. They attempted to escape and were heading towards Ukraine, where, according to preliminary information, …”
This is not the first time fabricated Chinese subtitles were added to Putin’s speeches.
For example, in November 2023, Annie Lab debunked two videos that falsely claimed the Russian president cautioned against Israel’s attack on the Gaza Strip.
We found that those videos were taken in June 2023 and February 2022, before the Israel-Hamas war began in early October 2023.
Fact-checking organization MyGoPen in Taiwan found fake subtitles were added to the June 2023 clip to spread a false claim that Putin threatened to attack Japan if Russia detected wastewater from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in the ocean.
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