DISINFO: French journalist: "Zelenskiy impresses Macron"
SUMMARY
A French journalist says that during his trip to Paris, Volodomyr Zelenskiy, the frontrunner in Ukraine’s presidential race, impressed Emmanuel Macron, pointing out similarities between the two men.
RESPONSE
This is a false quote, the words of the "French journalist" are fabricated. On April 12th, Ukrainian comedian and presidential candidate Volodymyr Zelensky and French president Emmanuel Macron indeed met in Paris. But Elise.com.ua falsely attributes this quote to French journalist Stephane Siohan, who was in fact first quoted by the Ukrainian website Strana.ua. Stephane Siohan works for Le Figaro, Le Temps and Le Soir in Kyiv. On his Facebook page, he mentions that he never spoke to Strana.ua.
“No, I never gave an interview on Strana.ua website about Zelensky. If you read a quote with my name, then this is a fake. I have never talked to Strana.ua and usually do not give interviews about the elections I work on. This is a principle. Especially in Ukraine”.
Strana.ua used Siohan's name and later changed it to “Lucas Talarn”. Google search still shows the previous version of the article on Strana.ua. Other websites still have the same quote with Stephane's name. Stephane told EUvsDisinfo:
“There are many sites which relay the info that I have given an interview to Strana.ua, but strangely Strana publishes an article with the name of an unknown journalist who doesn’t work in Ukraine.”