Amid protests in Sri Lanka, former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa fled to the Maldives. Against the above backdrop, a video is widely shared on social media with a claim that Rajapaksa was berated by onlookers as he arrived in the Maldives.
The caption associated with the video reads: “මාලදිවයින් වැසියන් ගෝඨාභය මහතා ඉතා උණුසුම් ලෙස පිළිගත් ආකාරය.” (English translation: “How Maldives welcomed Mr. Gotabaya very warmly.”)
The link to the post can be seen here.
FACT CHECK
NewsMobile did the fact-check, and found it to be misleading.
On doing a Google Reverse Image Search with one of the screenshots, we found the same video was uploaded by a YouTube channel, Ada Derana, on October 19, 2017. The video was shared with a description: “It has been reported that former defence secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa returned to Sri Lanka earlier today, dispelling rumours of his impending arrest.”
We compared the viral video with the original video and found them to be same.
Another website Onlanka also reported the same incident on October 19, 2017. Onlanka says: “The former defence secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa returned to Sri Lanka earlier today, dispelling rumours of his impending arrest.”
Hence, we can ascertain that the viral claim is misleading.
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