A video has been published with a caption that claims to show Kosovo's Prime Minister, Albin Kurti, honoring the national anthem of North Macedonia.
The content with this claim was published on Sunday (May 24) on Facebook by a page called "SkenderajLive" and on Monday (May 25) on the media website "DEMOCRACY".
What is the truth?
Hibrid.info noticed that the melody heard in the audio of this video material, which is claimed to be the anthem of North Macedonia, is actually the melody line of the European anthem.
Hibrid.info has previously addressed this claim (see here).
However, by the time of treatment, the video published by "SkenderajLive" had received over 120 thousand views, over 800 likes, around 350 shares and nearly 240 comments.
Meanwhile, the video published by "Democracy" has received over 5 thousand views, over 100 likes and more than 50 comments.
These engagement numbers and the content of the comments indicate that the claim was perceived as credible by a portion of the audience. For this reason, it is being addressed again in this article.
In the first treatment, it was found that Prime Minister Albin Kurti had participated in the congress of the VLEN coalition, held on May 9 in Skopje (see here, here and here).
Also, based on media reports, it was confirmed that only the anthem of the European Union (EU) was played at this event (see here and here).
Through "Youtube", the platform for publishing visual content (see here) video footage of the WLEN coalition congress was found (see here). The audio of the video confirmed that only one hymn was sung at the beginning of the congress (see here).
Through additional searches on YouTube and comparing the North Macedonian anthem with the EU anthem, it was confirmed that the melody heard at the VLEN congress is the anthem of the European Union (see here and here).
Analyze:
A video shared on Facebook claims to show Kosovo's 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 presented in the video caption is not accurate.
The investigation confirmed that the music heard in the background is not the anthem of North Macedonia, but the anthem of the European Union. The video is related to the congress of the vlen coalition in Skopje, where Prime Minister Kurti was present and where only the EU anthem was played.
This claim has been addressed previously by Hibrid.info.
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.