By Anmol Alphonso
An old video from a stadium in Kazan, Russia showing people offering namaz is being shared with the false claim that it is from the opening ceremony of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
On November 20, 2022, the opening ceremory of the FIFA World Cup 2022 was held at the Al Bayt stadium in Qatar. Hollywood actor Morgan Freeman started the cremony with an opening monoloudge. The 20-year-old Qatari YouTuber Ghanim Al Muftah also recited the verses of the Quran during the opening ceremony.
In the viral video, we can hear the azan (Islamic call to prayer) and a huge gathering of people can be seen offering the namaz in a staduim which has the name 'Kazan' on the stands.
The video is being shared with the caption when translated reads, "Football Stadium ( Qatar ) Alhamdulillah Iman refreshing scene".
(In Hindi - फुटबॉल स्टेडियम ( कतर) अल्हमदोलिल्लाह इमान ताज़ा कर देने वाला मंजर)
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The same video is being widely shared on Facebook with the false claim.
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FACT-CHECK
BOOM found that the viral video of people offering namaz in the stadium dates back online atleast to 2019 from a stadium in Kazan, Russia. The viral video is not from the 2022 FIFA World Cup that is currently being held in Qatar.
In the viral video, we can see 'Kazan' written on the stadium chairs.
Taking a cue from this, we then ran selected keyowrds like 'namaz at kazan stadium' which search results showed that the video is from Ak Bars Arena, which is a stadium in Kazan in Tatarstan, Russia.
We can even see the same 'Kazan' on Google Maps view of the stadium. Kazan is the capital of Tatarstan, a Russian republic which is a predominantly Muslim region.
The search results showed the same video uploaded on Facebook dating back to June 7, 2019.
The visuals in the video march the viral video and we can see 'Kazan' in the stands which shows that it is from the same stadium.
The caption of the post dated June 7, 2019, reads, "Prayers at Kazan Stadium, Tatarstan (May 25th 2019)..."
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Additionally, we also found another iftar video from June 2016, which caption reads, "Jun 22 , 2016 at the stadium " Kazan Arena " hosted the most mass Iftar in the history of the Republic of Tatarstan , 10 thousand . People were invited. The stadium was attended by President of Tatarstan"
This is a different video compared to the original 2019 video and also we can spot that the people in the crowd including the Imam are wearing different outfits.
We also found a report from June 2016 on 'Iftar at Kazan Arena' from Real Noevremya. The 2016 report states that the regional iftar was renwed at the stadium in 2014.
"It should be noted the first regional iftar for 1,000 people was in 2011 in the Millennium Square. In 2012, the celebratory supper was cancelled because of the murder of Muslim scholar Valiulla Yakupov and an assassination attempt of Ildus Fayzov, who was Mufti at that time. In 2013, the city was busy again: Kazan hosted the Universiade. The regional iftar renewed in 2014 – in the football stadium," reports Real Noevremya.
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We also found that the same video was being shared with false claims in August 2019 which was fact-checked by Indonesian fact-checker Tirto ID.
BOOM could not independly verify the incident, however we were able to establish that the video dates back atleast to 2019 and is not recent from the ongoing 2022 FIFA World Cup.
