Old Photos Of Xi Jinping's Mosque Visit Falsely Linked To Coronavirus

Posts across social media have surfaced claiming that Chinese President Xi Jinping has been visiting mosques to offer prayers to protect China from the deadly Coronavirus outbreak. The posts are viral in Bangla and Hindi alongside images with a logo of local news media CCTV. The photos showing Jinping at a mosque are originally from his July 2016 visit to Xincheng mosque in Yinchuan city, and are not connected to the recent Coronavirus outbreak.

The caption states: "Chinese president went to a mosque. He has been visiting mosques and requesting people to offer special prayers to protect China from the national disaster of Corona virus."

(Translated from Bengali: মসজিদে গেলেন চীনা রাষ্ট্রপতি, করোনা ভাইরাসের জাতীয় বিপর্যয় থেকে রক্ষা পেতে মসজিদে মসজিদে বিশেষ প্রার্থনা করার অনুরোধ করেন। #bangareport ছবি ফেসবুক থেকে সংগৃহীত, বঙ্গ রিপোর্টের পক্ষ থেকে এর সত্যতা যাচাই করা সম্ভব হয় নি।)

Another similarly captioned post on Facebook says: "At last good sense prevail on China. President reaches mosque to offer prayers in the context of the latest Corona virus."

(Translated from Bengali: #অবশেষে চীনের বোধোদয়!! রাষ্ট্রপতি মসজিদে এসে দোয়া চাইলেন করোনাভাইরাস থেকে মুক্তির জন্য। আল্লাহ হেদায়েত নসিব করুন)

Click here to view the post and its archived version here.

Many groups on Facebook have posts shared with text captioned over the images of Jinping at the mosque.

View the post here, and the archive here.

On Twitter, the images are being shared with a slightly different narrative but the same false claim.

Click here to view the tweet, and here for the archive.

Fact Check

BOOM found that these images of Xi Jinping are sourced from a CCTV Video News Agency video that is over three years old. The video captures the Chinese president visiting a mosque on a tour of Northwest China in July 2016. The viral posts have used stills from the same video and revived with false captions connected to the recent Coronavirus outbreak.

View the video below:

The news agency reports: "Chinese President Xi Jinping paid a special visit to the Xincheng Mosque in Yinchuan City Tuesday morning, during his current fact-finding tour of the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region in northwest China. The Chinese president chatted and compared notes with imams and Islamic followers in and outside of the mosque, the largest in the autonomous region and one of the largest in northwest China."

Recently, social media users have also circulated similar false claims for the Chinese Premier. Read the debunked story here.

Also Read: The Hindu Article Erroneously Links Filovirus Study To Coronavirus

Also Read: Did Dettol Know About Coronavirus Outbreak Beforehand? A FactCheck

India has so far confirmed three positive cases of Coronavirus. All the three cases are from Kerala and are people who travelled to India from Wuhan.The 2019-novel Coronavirus has now reached a death toll of 563 lives with over 28,338 cases confirmed globally, so far.

BOOM has debunked several such false messages surrounding the Coronavirus pandemic. View our thread on the same, below.