By Chris Menahan
InformationLiberation
Obese Russian “General Pavel,” “67,” who the media claimed a “desperate” Vladimir Putin called up to fight in Ukraine after losing so many generals, is actually 58-year-old Ivan Ivanovich Turchin, a veteran of both the Russian military and the Border Guard who retired in 2011, and there’s no evidence he’s in Ukraine.
Fact checkers Rien Emmery and Lotte Lambrecht with the Belgian media outlet Knack exposed the war propaganda hoax as “total bulls**t” over the weekend.
Remember this "exclusive" story in the Daily Star about "general Pavel", who was supposedly "dragged out of retirement" by Putin and sent to Ukraine?
So yeah, turns out that's total bullshit.@Lotte_Lambrecht and I found out who's _actually_ in this photo. Follow along!
— Rien Emmery (@ArbiterOfTweets) July 9, 2022