On 11 and 12 November, the Facebook account Manuchar Mancho Mukutadze, which has repeatedly spread disinformation in the past, published 12 posts (1; 2; 3; 4; 5) claiming that Ukrainian soldiers had surrendered in the city of Pokrovsk, Ukraine. The posts include several photos and videos, which, according to the attached descriptions, show Russian troops entering the city and Ukrainian soldiers surrendering. They also claim that 47,000 or even 50,000 Ukrainian servicemen surrendered to Russia.
Reports that 50,000 Ukrainian soldiers surrendered to Russia in Pokrovsk are not confirmed by open sources. Some of the videos are generated with artificial intelligence. The photos are old, and most of them show captured Russian soldiers or mercenary fighters serving on the Russian side.
The claims that 47,000 or 50,000 Ukrainian servicemen surrendered to Russia in Pokrovsk are false. The information is not confirmed by any open and reliable sources. In recent months, Russian sources have actively circulated claims that large groups of Ukrainian soldiers in the city were surrounded and beginning to surrender, but the Ukrainian side has denied these statements. It is notable that neither side has ever mentioned figures like 47,000 or 50,000 in their reports.
Several photos and videos are provided in the Facebook posts as “evidence,” but none of them depict Ukrainian soldiers being captured or surrendering in Pokrovsk.
One of the videos shows several men with their hands tied and a caption in Vietnamese, claiming that 700 Ukrainian servicemen laid down their arms near Pokrovsk. In reality, the video circulated in March 2022. According to the Russian side, it shows Ukrainian soldiers captured on 21 March near a Ukrainian command post in the suburbs of Kyiv (1; 2).
Another video shows dozens of captured Ukrainian soldiers being moved while armed Russian military personnel supervise and order them forward.
This video is generated using artificial intelligence. The watermark of OpenAI’s Sora model is visible on it. The model creates short videos based on user-provided text or photos.
Another AI-generated video shows hundreds of captured Ukrainian soldiers. The video shows characteristic AI flaws; for example, the soldiers’ fingers as well as the figures of soldiers standing further back appear merged together.
Another video shows soldiers moving through fog on motorcycles and various vehicles. According to Reuters, the video was shared on 11 November with a description that it shows Russian troops entering Pokrovsk. The outlet confirmed through geolocation that the video does indeed show Pokrovsk.
In addition to videos, a photo collage consisting of six images was shared in the Facebook posts as “evidence” of Ukrainian soldiers surrendering.
Research by Myth Detector established that none of these photos depict Ukrainian soldiers captured or surrendering in Pokrovsk.
The first photo (top-left in the collage) belongs to Azerbaijani online TV channel Kanal 13. The channel’s name appears in red in the bottom-left corner. This photo is the opening frame of a video published on the channel’s YouTube account on 7 October 2025. The video title claims that men are surrendering en masse to the Ukrainian side in Russian-occupied territories and that Russians are worried. The report mainly covers the Ukrainian perspective on Russia’s announced mobilization.
The second photo (top-right in the collage) was published by Ukrainian military TV channel Армія TV on its Telegram channel on 10 January 2024 and, according to them, shows three Russian nationals and one Somali national captured while fighting for Russia since December 2024.
The third photo (middle-left in the collage) was circulated by Russian media on 24 February 2022, which claimed it showed soldiers of Ukraine’s 53rd Brigade who voluntarily surrendered in the Donetsk region.
The fourth photo (middle-right in the collage) is from a video published on 4 January 2025 by Ukraine’s Air Assault Forces. According to their description, the video shows 14 Russian soldiers captured by two Ukrainian paratroopers. Ukrainian media also published identical photos and reports (1; 2).
The fifth photo (bottom-left in the collage) shows Russian fighters who were captured in February 2022 (1; 2).
The sixth photo (bottom-right in the collage) has been circulating online since February 2022. According to the Daily Mail, it shows Ukrainian soldiers captured in the Donetsk region. This is supported by a 25 April 2022 post in the Facebook group “People Search,” where the names and ages of the individuals in the photo are listed.
Therefore, the photos and videos being circulated do not show Ukrainian soldiers captured in Pokrovsk. Some of the videos were generated using artificial intelligence, and the photos are old, with many of them showing not Ukrainians but captured Russian soldiers and mercenary fighters.
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