A video has been published with a caption claiming to show Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti honoring the national anthem of North Macedonia.
The video material with this claim was published on Facebook on Saturday (May 9) by a page called "Drenica Graphic” and on Sunday (May 10) from the page named “Kosovalb.com".
What's wrong with the claim?
Hibrid.info noticed that the melody heard in the audio of this video belongs to the European anthem.
As of the time of writing, the video published on "Drenica Graphic" has received over 70 thousand views, has over 600 likes, 300 shares and has over 280 comments.
Meanwhile, in the other video published on "Kosovalb.com" it has nearly 7 thousand views, over 50 likes, 30 shares and over 30 comments.
From the content of the comments in these publications, it is estimated that the audience is likely to perceive the claim as credible.
Because this video shows Prime Minister Kurti in the presence of the Prime Minister of North Macedonia, Hristian Mickoski, hibrid.info first checked through the search engine “Google” with the words “albin kurti and hristijan mickoski” (see here).
The findings of this research resulted in several articles reporting the presence of Kurti and Mickoski next to each other at the congress of the VLEN coalition, held on Saturday in Skopje (see here, here and here).
In fact, several other articles reported that at the event where Kurti was present, the Albanian anthem was not played, with only the anthem of the European Union (EU) being played (see here and here).
Hibrid.info researched through "Youtube", the visual content publishing platform (see here). The search showed the video footage of the congress in question (see here). The audio of the video confirms that only one hymn was sung at the beginning of the congress (see here).
Based on the claim addressed and media reporting, hibrid.info, through Youtube, sought information about the anthem of North Macedonia and the anthem of the EU. After verifying the audio of both anthems, it was confirmed that the melody heard at the VALEN congress is the anthem of the EU (see here and here).
Analyze:
A video shared on Facebook claims to show Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti honoring the national anthem of North Macedonia during an official ceremony.
After verification conducted by hibrid.info, it turned out that the claim made in the video caption is not correct.
Through research, it was proven that the music heard in the background is not the anthem of North Macedonia, but the anthem of Europe.
Based on its work methodology, hibrid.info assesses the content as "Manipulation of facts".
Reasoning:
“Factual manipulation” is a rating given to informational content that uses facts known to be accurate but interprets them in a distorted manner. These reports typically use accurate information to draw incorrect conclusions or claims, thereby misleading consumers of media content about the actual meaning of the facts presented.