Reuters attributes false statements to Al-Houthi
Member of the Supreme Political Bureau in Yemen, Mohammad Ali Al-Houthi, criticizes Reuters for attributing fake news through sourcing a fake Twitter account.
-
Member of the Supreme Political Bureau in Yemen, Mohammad Ali Al-Houthi
Reuters news agency sourced Tuesday a fake Twitter account in the name of the member of the Supreme Political Bureau in Yemen, Mohammad Ali Al-Houthi, saying that Oman provided the Central Bank of Yemen with five billion dollars to help it pay the salaries of employees in the Sanaa government.
Later, the agency announced that it withdrew the news.
In response, Al-Houthi denied Reuters' news and tweeted that it is unfortunate that the agency made such a major mistake, and attributed false news without investigating the Twitter account that is sourced.
Al-Houthi pointed out that Reuters and other international media outlets must report correct information from trusted sources, and not from fake Twitter accounts. Earlier, the Yemeni politician tweeted the hashtag #ReutersFallen.
Reuters and other international media must ensure that accurate information is transmitted from their sources and not based on fake Twitter accounts.
— محمد علي الحوثي (@Moh_Alhouthi) April 12, 2022
Therefore, we invite you to tweet about this topic under the hashtag #ReutersFallen#سقوط_رويترزhttps://t.co/zgJWXFYp9Z
R
— محمد علي الحوثي (@Moh_Alhouthi) April 12, 2022
e
u
t
e
r
s#ReutersFallen#ReutersFallen
At a later time, Reuters confirmed that the source of the information is an unverified Twitter account attributed to Al-Houthi.
It is noteworthy that this is not the first time Reuters sources fake news based on fake social media accounts.
In October 2015, the news agency was forced to withdraw a story after publishing statements attributed to the former UN envoy to Yemen, Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmad, before it became clear that the information came from a fake account.
