An image has been shared in multiple posts on Facebook, Twitter and Reddit alongside claims that it shows trucks carrying COVID-19 relief that were set on fire by rebels of the New People’s Army (NPA), the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines.
Below is a screenshot of the misleading post:, The post’s caption reads\xa0in part: “NPA rebels burned down 7 cargo trucks / NPA rebels burned down on sunday 7 cargo trucks containing basic goods en route to Bukidnon after the owner failed to pay the rebels of ‘Revolutionary Tax’.”, Bukidnon is a landlocked province in Mindanao, a major\xa0island in southern Philippines., While the caption did not explicitly specify when the incident took place, comments by Facebook users\xa0suggest\xa0that the post was believed to be showing an attack that occured during the\xa0ongoing COVID-19 pandemic., One user commented: "What kind of people are these, capable of adding chaos during this pandemic? What you\ve been fighting for against the goverment sic? You are against everything, such a selfish act!”, Another commented: "son of a b***h!! the philippines already has a big problem because of covid19 they\xa0still refuse to be restrained\xa0demons contemptible NPA it\s just pure ideology for these fools!! hope you get infected of the virus", Below are screenshots of the comments:, The image was also shared alongside similar claims on Facebook\xa0here, here and here; on Twitter\xa0here; and on Reddit\xa0here., However, the image has been shared in a misleading context., A combined reverse image and keyword search on Google found the same image was published on Facebook\xa0here\xa0on March 10, 2015, at least five years before the COVID-19 outbreak., The caption of the\xa02015 post is identical to that of the misleading posts., Below is a screenshot of the misleading post (L) and the 2015 post (R), with publishing dates marked\xa0red by AFP:, The same photos were also published in March 2015 in blog posts about NPA activity here and here., "According to several\xa0media, NPA rebels set fire to seven trucks on March\xa08, 2015 in an operation that targeted a military unit on the\xa0Philippines Bukidnon province. The attacked was reported on\xa0here\xa0by GMA News,\xa0here\xa0by Mindanews and here\xa0by Sunstar.", , Copyright © AFP 2017-2020.  All rights reserved.  Users can access and consult this website and use the share features available for personal, private, and non-commercial purposes.  Any other use, in particular any reproduction, communication to the public or distribution of the content of this website, in whole or in part, for any other purpose and/or by any other means, without a specific licence agreement signed with AFP, is strictly prohibited.  The subject matter depicted or included via links within the Fact Checking content is provided to the extent necessary for correct understanding of the verification of the information concerned.  AFP has not obtained any rights from the authors or copyright owners of this third party content and shall incur no liability in this regard.  AFP and its logo are registered trademarks.
These photos have circulated online since at least 2015 – years before the COVID-19 pandemic | AFP Fact Check