A photo showing a series of coffins with Chinese flags draped over them is being used to claim that Chinese soldiers were killed following a recent clash with the Indian Army at Tawang, Arunachal Pradesh.
BOOM found that the claim is false, and the photo is from 2010.
Indian and Chinese soldiers clashed at the LAC in Tawang, Arunachal Pradesh in the intervening night of December 8 and 9, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh informed the Lok Sabha on December 13.
Since then, several false claims have been circulating on social media about how the Indian Army pushed back and ended up defeating the Chinese. Among those claims, a photo is also being circulated on Twitter that claims to be of a Chinese funeral service. The photo shows several coffins covered by the Chinese flag to claim Chinese deaths during the Tawang clash.
However, no casualties have been reported from either side so far.
A Twitter user shared the photo with the caption, "💥Tawang Says Hi (credit - Slayer squad) Half size Ching Chong Ding Dong single-child pampered sissy lulu should not mess with double the size Men in Uniform."
Click here for the tweet and here for the archive.
Click here to view.
FACT-CHECK
BOOM found that the photo is not from the Tawang clash, but from Kangding, China, in 2010.
We ran a reverse image search on Tineye and found a photo story by China News from 7 December, 2010. One of the photos from the story was an exact match to our viral photo.
A bushfire in the Daofu Country, Sichuan, on 5 December led to the death of 15 soldiers. Their coffins were brought to Kangding ahead of a memorial service held for the deceased soldiers with their family members present.
We translated the Chinese caption below the photo using Google translate, a screenshot of which is attached here:
We also found reports by Reuters and South China Morning Post that further explain the incident.
According to SCMP, a total of 22 casualties were reported due to the fire, including civilians. Almost 300 PLA soldiers were sent to the scene for rescue operations, out of which 15 died.
The memorial service for the deceased was held on 9 December, according to China News.
