Several news portals in Kosovo seem to have fallen prey to unconfirmed news regarding the car explosion last night in the city of Istanbul, describing it as a new terrorist attack after the one that occurred days ago in Taksim Square in this city.
Portals such as "Insajderi.org", "GazetaBlic.com", "Demokracia.com" and "Drenicasot.info" have published this article with the title "New attack in Istanbul, car bomb explodes".
These aforementioned portals based this news on an unverified Twitter account called "LWNChannel", which attached the video of the burning car with the caption "Another terrorist attack reported in Turkey, a car bomb...".
Links to the article published on information portals in Kosovo:
You can find the posting of this video with unconfirmed information published on Twitter by the account "LWNChannel" here.
Regarding this article that was distributed in online media in Kosovo, the Albanian journalist and editor at the international Turkish Radio Television "TRT World", Abdylvehab Ejupi, has also reacted, and through his Facebook account has confirmed that the news of a terrorist attack in Fatih/Istanbul is not true. (see here)
Ejupi's full post on Facebook:
The news of a terrorist attack in Fatih /Istanbul is not true.
Images of the fire in Istanbul's Fatih are spreading rapidly, especially on social media. And everyone, unanimously, reflects the event with the perception of a "terrorist attack" and many of them use the term "vehicle bomb".
All these accounts, without any confirmation,
and unanimously portray the incident as a new terrorist attack in Istanbul and turn it into a perception operation against Turkey. Be careful not to contribute.
What happened is an incident that could happen anywhere:
The driver of the car with the license plate number 34 GS 6448 on Kocamustafapaşa Street, Fatih, noticed smoke coming from his vehicle, which was running on gas (LPG), stopped on the side of the road and asked for help from people around. After a while, the vehicle caught fire as a result of the gas leak and the fire spread to the 4 vehicles that were nearby. The fire was quickly extinguished by firefighting teams. No casualties or injuries were reported.
The Turkish Radio Television for the Balkans portal "TRT Balkan" has also reacted to this news published by the "LWNChannel" account. This portal explained that the burning of several cars in Istanbul, the regional media have presented as a new terrorist attack, citing an unconfirmed profile on Twitter. (see here)
That this Twitter account is not credible is shown by the fact that it was opened in November of this year and currently has only 75 followers. (see here)
Analyze:
Several portals in Kosovo have fallen prey to an unconfirmed Twitter account, which reported that a terrorist attack involving a car bomb had occurred in Istanbul last night (November 15).
This post from this account was posted as a matter of course by several portals in Kosovo, without verifying it.
Based on the working methodology, hibrid.info rates this article as "Unverified Content".
Reasoning:
The “Unverified” rating is given to those media reports that do not provide sufficient information to confirm the claims made in the report, and which have not been able to confirm the same due to the lack or non-possession of reliable sources.