Each week, in a partnership with Correctiv, Exberliner will bring you some reports that have been circulating online in Germany – and the corresponding fact check.
This week, the story is about a potential “Russian shop in Germany” that was attacked. The video, shared more than 6,200 times on Twitter, appeared to show a business whose windows were smashed and had paint thrown at its walls in what appeared to be a politically motivated incident.
But was this real, or a fake? Correctiv were able to recognise the police car as having a number plate from the German region of North-Rhine Westphalia and contacted the police force there, who confirmed that yes, this was a legitimate incident. On the morning of March 2, they had become aware of vandalism at a Russian grocery store, and were not ruling out a political motive.
According to a report from the German Press Agency, a spokesperson from the store had stressed that the store’s workforce were multicultural, and bore no responsibility for the situation currently unfolding in Ukraine.
This is not the only anti-Russian incident has been reported in the past weeks: there was also the case of a Munich doctor refusing to treat Russian patients, and a bakery which removed the word “Russian” from one of their products.
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