Russian officials and conspiracy theorists are promoting a baseless claim about the March 9 bombing of a maternity hospital in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, an attack Western leaders have described as a “war crime.”
The airstrike killed three civilians, including a child, and left 17 wounded. But online, some assert the hospital bombing never took place.
“The Kyiv regime's bogus claim that Russian missile hit a maternity hospital,” reads a March 10 Facebook post that generated more than 300 shares in less than a week. “More info is emerging about the fake scene staged at the Mariupol hospital.”
As evidence, social media users cited photos of an injured pregnant woman they claimed was a “crisis actor,” someone who is paid to play a victim in high-profile tragedies. The term is popular among conspiracy theorists and has been used by Russian state media in recent weeks to downplay the invasion of Ukraine.
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“The Ukrainians used the model Marianna from Mariupol for the shots,” reads a March 10 Facebook post. “Marianna is a well-known beauty blogger and posed for the photo shoots in the ruins of the hospital. She played two pregnant women at once, changed clothes and applied new ‘bloody’ make-up.”
Other social media users suggested the Mariupol maternity hospital stopped functioning and that personnel and...
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