There is no evidence that the author of the letter is Putin. No credible news has ever mentioned that, nor the website of the Kremlin that usually publishes the addresses and speeches of the Russian President. The letter in the Russian language has been circulating since at least April 2022, but without citing an original source, writes Truthmeter.
Under the content-sharing agreement between Truthmeter.mk and Meta.mk, we republish the text in full below:
We are fact-checking a post on Facebook sharing an alleged letter from the Russian President Vladimir Putin sent to the world.
Only with courage and determination can you defeat evil, Nazism, states the post that is allegedly sharing the letter written in Serbian language titled as “Vladimir Putin’s letter to the world”.
In the letter, Russian President Putin seems to be referring to the Russian war with Ukraine, asking the citizens of Western countries to help Russia in its fight against “Ukrainian Nazism” that is “fed by the USA and the NATO hawks with your taxes”.
The letter attracted the interest of fact-checkers from ABP and Logically Facts. Their fact-check showed that in several cases, the post about the letter included a video from Putin saying that Western elites do not care for improving the lives of their citizens and that they were increasing inflation, thereby amplifying global poverty and inequality.
The letter circulating on Facebook from at least last October is in English. The alleged Putin letter was posted on the social network X (former Twitter) on the 25th of December 2023.
However, although the letter is ascribed to Putin, there is no evidence that he is the author.
By searching keywords and paragraphs of the letter, not one quotation from a credible piece of news, nor on the Kremlin’s official website where usually Putin’s addresses are published.
The previously mentioned post on X has a direct link to the video appearing in several posts of the letter. The video was posted on TikTok on the 8th of December 2023.
By reverse imaging of the key video frames, one finds out that Putin’s video originates from the video conference held on the 16th of March 2022. The translation accurately transmits Putin’s words. Nevertheless, a part is missing from the alleged letter that correlates with what Putin had said during the meeting.
If the letter is translated in Russian by means of a translation tool, and if parts of the letter are searched on Google and the Russian search engine Yandex, it will become clear that such a letter circulated in Russian back in Spring 2022. The original author of the letter is unknown. The earliest example that can be found is the post on the Russian platform for social media OK from the 10th of April 2022. Posts of the letter are also present on Blogspot and Telegram but without links or references to any original source.
On the 16th of March 2022, an article published in the Russian newspaper “Komsomolskaya Pravda” reporting on the video conference that Putin had that same day bears the headline “Vladimir Putin sent a message to the world from the meeting of the regional heads and the world heard it”. This headline is similar to the headline of the post “The letter of Vladimir Putin to the world” which was disseminated on social media.
Although no part of the letter appears in the article, the text is focused on how Putin addressed the West at the conference meeting which seems to have acted as a springboard for the letter, thereby explaining why the letter is now shared with a video from that exact conference.
The conclusion from all of this is that no evidence is available proving that Putin wrote the letter. That has not been mentioned by any credible piece of news, nor by the Kremlin’s website where the addresses and speeches of the Russian President are usually published. The letter in Russian has been circulating since at least April 2022, but without citing any original source. Therefore, the fact-checked post is assessed as incorrect.
