Tribune Fact Check: Imran Khan’s arrest
In the aftermath of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan's arrest, social media platforms have become breeding grounds for the dissemination of fake news and misinformation. The arrest of the prominent political figure has triggered a surge in online activity, with users sharing unverified pictures, distorted facts, and misrepresented videos.
Claim: Picture of Imran Khan behind bars
On May 10, the day after Imran Khan was arrested, a picture went viral on social media platforms claiming to be the former prime minister sitting in a prison cell after his arrest. The picture immediately went viral and was used globally without any verification.
Fact Check:
The viral pictures carried a watermark “exclusive by midjourney”. Midjourney is an AI tool that generates images from natural language descriptions, called ‘prompts. According to its website, it is ‘an independent research lab exploring new mediums of thought and expanding the imaginative powers of the human species’.
According to a New Yorker article, newly accessible tools such as Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, and dall-e are able to render a photorealistic landscape, copy a celebrity’s face, remix an image in any artist’s style, and seamlessly replace image backgrounds.
The pictures produced by AI technologies such as midjourney has a common feature of ill-producing the hands and feet.
In one of the AI generated pictures, Imran Khan’s hands can be seen to be deformed and alien.
Claim: Viral document outlining conditions agreed upon regarding the treatment of Imran Khan while he is under arrest
A purported agreement outlining special treatment for Imran Khan during his incarceration surfaced on social media platforms outlining the terms and conditions on how the former prime minister shall be treated when under arrest.
Fact Check:
The document may look authentic but on further inspection, it carried multiple flaws that proved it to be fraudulent.
The document dated May 8, 2023 is signed by “Interior Secretary Yousuf Naseem Khokhar”. However, Khokhar resigned from his position as the interior secretary on March 7, 2023.
Furthermore, his signature on the viral document did not match with his signature on official documents.
Signature on Viral Document
Signature on official document
Another discrepancy was the official spelling of the former interior secretary’s name being “Yousuf” instead of “Yousaf”.
In addition, the document was supposedly printed on Imran Khan’s party PTI’s official letterhead however, the format on the viral agreement was different to the official format of PTI’s letterhead including the date format on top right corner.
Format on viral document (DD\MM\YYYY)
Format on official letterhead (Month DD, YYYY)
Hence, a forged document is surfacing online and The Express Tribune rpoves it to be fake.
Claim: Pakistan’s political leaders celebrating Imran Khan’s arrest
A video was making rounds on social media depicting leaders of political parties of Pakistan celebrating Imran Khan’s arrest.
A Twitter user shared the footage with the caption, “Cabal of crooks having fun after Khan Saab’ arrest… your days are doomed, soon or later we’ll get back to you.”
In the video, chairman of Pakistan People’s Party and current foreign minister of Pakistan Bilawal Bhutto Zardari can be seen rejoicing alongside former prime minister Yousaf Raza Gillani and Pakistan’s minister of national health services Abdul Qadir Patel who is chanting “Ragre pe Ragra”.
Fact Check:
The original video was uploaded on the YouTube channel of Abdul Qadir Patel titled “Ragre pe ragra, Abdul Qadir Patel Celebrating With Chairman PPP Bilawal Bhutto Zardari” on April 8th, 2022 following the ouster of Imran Khan after he lost the vote of no confidence.
Claim: Crowd protesting outside Nawaz Sharif’s London home
Ashok Swain, a professor of peace and conflict studies at Uppsala University, tweeted a video of a protest claiming that it was shot outside former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s house in London. He claimed that the ‘protest had gone global’
The video shows a massive crowd gathered outside Nawaz Shareef’s London home Avenfield following Imran Khan’s arrest and chanting slogans against the PML-N leader.
Fact Check:
The video was confirmed to be an old footage of protestors gathered outside Nawaz Sharif’s Avenfield residence.
On inspection, The Express Tribune found the video to be not recent as an aftermath of Imran Khan’s arrest but from April 2022.
The video is originally from the protests in London outside the residence of Pakistan Muslim League supremo Nawaz Sharif, after Imran Khan was ousted following the vote of no confidence in April 2022.
Claim:
As social media platforms were flooded with visuals of crowds gathered at different places to show solidarity with Imran Khan, one such video circulated claiming to be a crowd of angry protestors gathered in Karachi after Imran Khan’s arrest, capturing a large gathering waving PTI flags and passionately chanting pro-Imran Khan slogans, raising concerns about the situation's gravity.
Viral image
Several social media users shared the footage claiming to show massive support for the PTI Chief following his recent arrest. The video was also tweeted by @PTIofficial on May 10, 2023 stating, “This was last night, iA the crowds will be bigger today to protect Imran Khan! #BehindYouSkipper”
Fact Check: Citizens protest in Karachi after Imran’s arrest
As the video became more popular, multiple people took to twitter to verify the original video. Multiple users claimed the viral clip to be from April 10th, 2022, Karachi.
A Google lens search led us to the source of the video to be a Facebook page “Just Pakistani Things”. The original video clip was posted on April 10th, 2022 with the caption “We out here making history! Karachi Millennium Mall (Rashid Minhas). Sent by: Shaheer Ahmed”
The original video was first posted by Facebook user Shaheer Ahmed stating that the video is of the protest showing solidarity with Imran Khan after he was ousted in April 2022 following the vote of no confidence. The location as per the user is Millenium mall, Karachi.
Therefore, it can be concluded that the clip posted by multiple users claiming to be protests in reaction to Imran Khan’s arrest is fake and originally it was a crowd from April 2022 gathered after the former prime minister’s ouster.