Since the beginning of August, a publication has been circulating virally on X (ex-Twitter). According to a netizen, it would have been called for the end of the war in Ukraine on a luminous billboard which would be in Tokyo, in Japan. In the twelve-second video, the person behind the camera films the storefront above a store where a message scrolls through the illuminated sign. In a modern, colorful font, it reads “Stop Zelensky. stop war » [« Arrêtez Zelensky ! Arrêtez la guerre ! » en français]. But there is a good chance that this video is from an edit. 20 minutes explains why.
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According to a reverse image search, it is possible to trace the origin of the video, which was actually published two years ago, before the start of the war in Ukraine. It’s about of a video called “A night walk in Tokyo Shibuya”, a borough of the city considered the epicenter of Japanese culture. Initially, the video was posted by YouTube account “Virtual Japan”which seeks “to share the experience of being in Japan and offer a daily slice of life of what it is to really be there”.
During the video which lasts one hour and 48 minutes, we find the sequence in question from the twentieth minute. It’s the same video with an easily recognizable tracking shot. Other clues allow us to verify this: the black taxi and the yellow taxi on the road to the left of the image, the man in a suit crossing at the same time as the cameraman or the motorbike parked at the level of the pedestrian crossing .
On the original images, it is not a sign calling for an end to the war that we see, but music videos and advertisements featuring several women. It is these last images that have been diverted.
What about the current relationship between Japan and Ukraine? For more than a year, the Asian country has declared itself formally opposed to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Last May, Tokyo announced new sanctions against Russia, namely freezing the assets of 17 Russian nationals and 78 Russian organizations, as well as banning the export of goods and services to 80 Russian entities. While the country has forbidden itself – since the Second World War – the delivery of arms to countries at war, Japan could finally give up its pacifism to help the Ukrainian army. But for now, nothing has been finalized.