Czech presidential candidate Pavel denies reports of his own death

Because the polls opened for the second spherical of the Czech presidential elections on Friday, the main candidate Petr Pavel discovered himself on the centre of a weird disinformation incident.

A number of Czech information retailers and social media customers mentioned they obtained emails saying the previous common had all of a sudden died the evening earlier than the election.

The e-mail included a hyperlink to an internet site almost similar to Pavel’s official one, and the individuals behind this unusual announcement even went so far as to jot down an obituary for the candidate.

Petr Pavel mentioned the extent of disinformation had hit a brand new low: “Sure, I am alive. I by no means thought I must write this. Somebody is sending out a faux model of my web site with the information of my demise on behalf of my spokesperson.”

A couple of hours later, the previous common jokingly posted a tweet photoshopping himself onto the well-known James Bond film poster No Time to Die.

And even Pavel’s opponent Andrej Babiš responded to the faux demise announcement, commenting on Twitter: “Though we’re rivals, I completely agree with you.”

“It is disgusting and I am sorry that anybody would stoop right down to such a factor. The police ought to look into this completely, similar to they did with the nameless one that threatened me,” mentioned Babis.

The previous prime minister claims he obtained demise threats and that lately, a letter with a bullet casing was mailed on to his spouse.

In line with Czech media and different specialists, the imitation web site is nameless, and the emails on that area have been routed by means of the Russian Yandex internet portal.

Filip Rozanek, a media analyst mentioned that “somebody put in plenty of effort to cover their tracks and never be traceable.”

Earlier this week, The Dice coated one other slew of unusual textual content messages some voters claimed to have obtained from Petr Pavel’s workforce asking them to go to the closest department of the Armed forces, so as to obtain gear for mobilisation to Ukraine.

It is nonetheless unclear who’s behind any of those faux messages.