Smart city project in Ladyzhyn misidentified as a 15-minute city, fuels claim that the war in Ukraine is a hoax

By: Ankita Kulkarni
April 20 2023

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Context

A social media post containing a screenshot of a Tweet falsely claims that "the first 15-minute city in #Ukraine is ready. The smart city of Ladîjin, Vinnytsia region. #15MinuteCities." A Facebook user sharing the image wrote, "How come this is even possible in an alleged war torn country." However, the posts make incorrect claims.

In Fact

A reverse image search of the photographs shared in the Twitter post led us to an article by the Ukrainian National News Agency UNN. UNN reports that the city police of Ladyzhyn in Vinnytsia Oblast, Ukraine, has introduced a "Smart City" project that involves the installation of surveillance cameras and sensors to record around the clock. These sensors will transmit real-time data to the "Situation Center," where the data is processed to track suspicious events. The system will be able to scan faces, detect fires, search for lost people, warn about dangerous objects, and identify anti-social activities.

The report also included several images from the launch presentation that match those in the Twitter post. This makes it evident that the pictures were taken during the launch of the "Smart City" and are not related to 15-minute city plans.

An article by Ukrainian news agency Rubryka reported that the project also involves drones that help to capture images and videos quickly and send them to the center. The same pictures and information were posted on Facebook by the People's Deputy of Ukraine, Mykola Ivanovych Kucher. This clarifies that this is a smart city project deployed to track and monitor potential offenders, not a plan to introduce a 15-minute city, as the viral post claims.

The 15-minute city concept has been at the center of a lot of misinformation and false claims. The narrative that links traffic schemes to 15-minute cities stems from a conspiracy theory that established a false connection between the Oxford traffic filter scheme and a 15-minute neighborhood plan. The theory falsely claims that these traffic sensors are to control and restrict people's movement. Logically Facts has published multiple articles debunking these theories. Additionally, the narrative that the war in Ukraine is fake is also false, as governments and other organizations worldwide have well documented the war with several eyewitnesses, authentic images, and videos that show destruction due to the war.

The Verdict

A smart city project launched in Ladyzhyn City in Ukraine has been incorrectly perceived as a 15-minute city by linking it to unproven conspiracy theories and questioning the existence of the Ukraine war. Therefore, we have marked the claim as false.