Clips from a music video produced by Ukrainian soldiers, which marked the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, have been taken out of context.
A series of video clips have been circulating on social media, claiming to show Ukrainians putting makeup on and pretending to go to war.
One account named “Liberal Tear Creator” shared a series of three videos, alleging that soldiers were “faking combat”, in order to appear “war torn” and get funds from the US.
Although the clips have not been manipulated, they have been misleading taken out of context.
A search of the TikTok handle “vitsikkkk” which appears in the clip took Euroverify to the account of a Ukrainian combat medic named Vitsyk, who has nearly 300k followers. He also has a YouTube channel with almost 15k subscribers.
Further investigating revealed that the clips had been taken out of context, from the behind the scenes of a music video called “Brothers”, which Vitsyk posted on his channel in February 2025 to mark the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
In the music clip, the same woman who online users claimed was putting fake make-up on, can be spotted.
Her name is Mariana Chechelyuk and she was captured by Russian forces while defending the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol in April 2022.
Chechelyuk was released in May 2024, after spending 25 months in Russian captivity.
On Instagram, Chechelyuk addressed the misleading posts with disbelief, stating “what is there to say.”
“The purpose of the video was to show the pain of Ukrainian soldiers who lose their loved ones every day, for their brothers who have become their family during the war”, Chechelyuk told Euronews.
The music video, which Vitsyk produced the song for, also features three other Ukrainian soldiers who were captured while defending the Azovstal steel plant.
Speaking to Euronews, Vitsyk said “I am a creative soldier, for me music and songs are medicine that dull my pain from the loss of my best friends.”
Defending the video, Vitsyk said “every word in our creative reality is written in blood. Every pixel and costume in our music video, as well as bulletproof vest and helmet have been through so much more in real life.”
“We are not actors” he added, calling on those who suspect the war in Ukraine to “be a film, to come and visit the country.”
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