On March 9, Russian forces struck a maternity and children's hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, leaving three dead at the scene and over a dozen injured.
Many were horrified by the photos and videos of the aftermath. One photo, in particular, of an injured pregnant woman being carried out on a stretcher captured the sheer brutality of the bombing for everyone watching around the world. The young woman seen in the photo and her unborn child died later that day, as doctors attempted to save their lives, adding to the death toll.
However, in the hours after the bombing, Russian propaganda claiming that both the photos and deadly bombing itself were staged started to spread online. And a young pregnant Ukrainian woman was caught in the middle.
Marianna Vishegirskaya, one of many injured pregnant women at the decimated Mariupol hospital was targeted by a Russian disinformation campaign that tried – and ultimately failed – to flip the blame and attempt to disprove the reality of the deadly attack. Vishegirskaya was likely targeted because she's a popular internet personality in Ukraine, known as @gixie_beauty on Instagram. Her work was used as false pretext to cast her in the role of 'crisis actor,' a classic Russian propaganda tactic that has also been despicably used by far-right groups and conspiracy theorists in the U.S. – like when victims of mass shootings (Sandy Hook, Parkland) were falsely accused of being paid actors.
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Vishegirskaya can be seen walking through the rubble in photos taken at the scene after the hospital bombing. But the reason she is there is quite clear to anyone who looks at the photos on her Instagram account, which were posted before Russia began its war in Ukraine. Vishegirskaya is clearly pregnant and was at the maternity hospital as a patient.
Days after the bombing Vishegirskaya gave birth to a healthy baby girl.
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The disinformation appears to have originated from a Russian Telegram channel called "Signal," which has half a million subscribers on the platform. It is likely that this disinformation campaign was coordinated by the Russian government. A paid propaganda campaign was recently uncovered by Vice, for example, showing how influential Russian TikTok personalities were being paid to spread pro-Kremlin propaganda about the war.
"Signal uncovered the girl who photographers photographed in the wreckage of the maternity hospital in Mariupol," reads the Telegram message as translated by the independent Russian news outlet, Meduza. "She turned out to be a model and a popular beauty blogger in Mariupol. Her name is Marianna Podgurskaya…The same model appeared in all three scenes."
The Podgurskaya referenced by the channel is Vishegirskaya's maiden name.
The Telegram post asserted that the hospital was evacuated and the photos were staged. Two specific photos from the bombing scene, one showing an injured pregnant woman on a stretcher and one with a pregnant woman walking through the rubble, were included with the post. They were set side-by-side with photos from Vishegirskaya's Instagram account. The Signal channel identified Vishegirskaya as the woman in both photos.
Not long after, these falsehoods about Vishegirskaya and the Mariupol maternity hospital were spread far and wide by official Russian state and diplomatic accounts.
The Russian Embassy in the UK tweeted a number of times, claiming that Vishegirskaya played two different women photographed at the hospital. Interestingly, the Russian Embassy also referenced Vishegirskaya by her maiden name, Podgurskaya.
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"She actually played roles of both pregnant women on the photos," tweeted the Russian Embassy, repeating the crisis actor falsehoods about Vishegirskaya portraying multiple pregnant women and going on to reference her Instagram account.
Twitter later removed the Russian Embassy's lies for violating the platform's misinformation policies.
Pro-Russia social media personalities also helped spread the conspiracy theory online.
"Regarding pregnant women, who allegedly survived in the maternity house targeted by Russia," tweeted Maria Dubovikova, known as @politblogme on Twitter, sharing pro-Kremlin propaganda. "The Ukrainian fake factory masters used the model Marianna from Mariupol…She played two different pregnant women at once."
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The false claim was further spread when Dubovikova's tweet was shared by Maajid Nawaz, a former British radio show host, who recently gained prominence after appearing on Joe Rogan's podcast where he discussed COVID-19 conspiracy theories.
Twitter removed Dubovikova's tweet for disinformation shortly after it was posted as well.
It didn't take long, however, for the conspiracy about the pregnant Instagram blogger to gain traction across the internet. Instagram users who believed the misinformation even started to leave harassing comments on Vishegirskaya's Instagram photos based on the crisis actor lies.
The images that came out of the March 9 bombing in Mariupol have been some of the most horrific yet during Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Photos and videos that were being passed around on platforms like Telegram — the very same platform where the disinformation originated from — actually showed the gruesomely real injuries that never made it onto mainstream media outlets.
Marianna Vishegirskaya was indeed at the maternity hospital in Mariupol when it was targeted by a Russian airstrike. The pregnant woman, now a mother, can be seen in photos walking on foot through the rubble. She survived and gave birth to a daughter in the days after the bombing. A completely different pregnant woman is viewed in the photo from the hospital bombing, injured and being stretchered out. Sadly, multiple news outlets have confirmed with doctors on the scene that the unidentified woman on the stretcher did not survive. Neither did her unborn child.
This particular Russian disinformation campaign failed to change the narrative thanks to the quick actions taken by journalists, fact checkers, and social media activists. However, propaganda about Russia's war in Ukraine continues to be disseminated online.
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