Actual Video of Zelenskyy Stomach Dancing?

In July 2024, a viral video claimed to point out Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy doing a stomach dance in what seemed to be a glowing crimson bodysuit.

A put up on X shared the video and wrote within the caption that Zelenskyy was “president within the morning and a dancer at evening.”

(X consumer @Michael0Hoss)

The put up spread across X for a number of months, going again to early 2024, and has additionally been viral on TikTok. The background music has additionally diverse in every put up that shared the dancing. 

Nonetheless, the video is a deep faux that took Zelenskyy’s face and digitally positioned it on the determine of one other particular person doing the stomach dance within the video. We discovered proof of the video relationship again to 2020 in addition to a number of different movies of the identical particular person dancing with the identical costume and in different settings. As such, we fee this video as “Pretend.”

Utilizing reverse-image search, we discovered what seemed to be an unaltered version of the video being shared on the web round 2022. This model confirmed a person in the identical costume and setting, however with very totally different options from the Ukrainian president. 

Digging additional into the origins of this video, we discovered TikTok consumer vusaaal printed the video in October 2020. This TikTok account additionally shared quite a few movies of this particular person doing extra dance strikes in the identical setting, with the identical costume in several settings, or the carrying variations of the outfit in different contexts. 

In accordance with Google Translate, the above caption acknowledged, “Dances, my dances, how do you want them? Trendy or oriental?” 

The identical individual reposted the video in 2023 on TikTok. In 2022, the account shared a distinct portion of the dance however in the identical setting and outfit. In 2021, the TikTok account shared a video of the dancer acting on what seemed to be a tv present carrying headgear and a barely totally different model of the identical outfit. The identical individual reposted the video in 2023 on TikTok.

The TikTok account directs us to an Instagram account for the consumer Vusaaaal, which apparently belongs to Vusal Mekhtiev, a “Dancer/choreographer” primarily based in Turkey. We reached out to the Instagram consumer and can replace this put up if we get extra data. 

This isn’t the primary time Zelenskyy has been the topic of rumors primarily based on his leisure background. Earlier than he was president, he was a comic and actor and had performed in a parody music video and the Ukrainian version of the dance competitors, “Dancing With the Stars.” Because of this, quite a few, unrelated movies have been falsely manipulated to point out Zelenskyy in uncommon conditions, like stomach dancing, and showing to make false statements. 

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