Neither Valery Zaluzhnyi nor European Solidarity reported on this. This «news» was spread primarily by Russian Telegram channels. The fake ID uses an old photograph of the former commander-in-chief, taken from his biography.
Social media users spread information that ex-commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces Valery Zaluzhnyi allegedly joined the European Solidarity party after his removal from office. A photo of Zaluzhny’s party ID, allegedly obtained on February 12, 2024, is cited as proof of such «news».
«It seems that the political struggle between Zelenskyi and the Zaluzhnyi/Poroshenko bloc is coming», users comment.
This information is completely unreliable. None of the official communication channels of the European Solidarity party wrote about Valery Zaluzhny’s entry into the party. Instead, politicians actively commented on the resignation of the chairman on various platforms. There are no reports about this on Zaluzhny’s official social media accounts either. His last public address concerns gratitude for being awarded the title of Hero of Ukraine. At the same time, the news about the ex-commander-in-chief to this party was spread exclusively by Russian news sources.
Another worthwhile detail is the so-called party certificate, which also was shared on Russian Telegram channels. An image search finds a similar photo of the ID card of former infrastructure minister Volodymyr Omelyan, who joined European Solidarity in 2020. However, at that time such an event was widely covered in the media and actively commented on by the party itself. Obviously, such a high-ranking person as Zaluzhnyi joining a political party would not go unnoticed either. Instead, it was reported only by Russian information resources. StopFake reached out to the party’s press office for comment, but had not yet received a response at the time of publication.
Ukrinform journalists also drew attention to the fact that an old photo of Valery Zaluzhny, which can be easily found online, was used for the party ID card.
Previously, StopFake refuted the Russian fakes that accompanied the publication of Valery Zaluzhny’s article on the CNN website.
