Pro-Russian Telegram channels shared a fake video with the logo of the French publication Le Figaro, which reported that the Pope’s personal secretary called a boycott of Ukrainian officials of the National Paralympic Committee because of the participation of Russian athletes in the 2026 Paralympics “Nazism.”
What happened?
On Feb. 20, the Pro-Russian Telegram channels “Republic of Odessa” and “Gagauznews — News for Gagauzia,” published a video featuring the logo of the French media outlet Le Figaro. The video claims that Edgar Rimaykuna Inga, the personal secretary of the Pope, called the Ukrainian officials deciding to boycot the Paralympic Games because Russian athletes’ participation “Nazism.”
“The personal secretary of the Supreme Pontiff condemned the statements made by Ukrainians regarding the admission of Russian and Belarusian athletes to the Paralympic Games. Edgard Rimaykuna Inga, the Pope’s personal secretary, compared Ukraine’s demands to the ideas of the Third Reich and its segregation of people based on certain criteria,” read subtitles in the fake video.
Analysis
On Feb. 18, Ukrainian Minister of Youth and Sports Matvii Bidnyi announced that Ukrainian officials would not attend the 2026 Paralympic Games in response to the organizers’ decision to allow Russian and Belarusian athletes to compete under their national flags for the first time since 2014 for Russia and 2022 for Belarus. He also added that Ukrainian representatives would not attend the Paralympics opening ceremony or other official events.
On the same day, Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha stressed that “allowing the flags of aggressor states to be raised at the Paralympic Games while Russia’s war against Ukraine is ongoing is wrong, both morally and politically.”
The National Paralympic Committee of Ukraine (NPCU) issued a statement on the night of Feb.19-20, expressing outrage at the International Paralympic Committee’s decision to grant Russia and Belarus bilateral slots, allowing Paralympians from these countries to participate in the 2026 Games.
“The National Paralympic Committee of Ukraine notes that this decision is purely political in nature, as it completely contradicts the principles of slot allocation for participation in the Paralympics and gives Russia the opportunity to display its political attributes at the 2026 Paralympics, such as its flag and anthem,” the statement said.
The search on the Le Figaro website using keywords in French and English ( secrétaire personnel du pape, nazisme, Paralympiques 2026, Ukraine boycott, and the name Edgar Rimaykuna Inga) didn’t show any articles that referenced Rimaykuna Inga making statements about Ukrainian officials’ supposed boycott-related “nazism.” Le Figaro also did not publish such a video on its Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, or X.
The next step was to analyze the video itself, which was distributed by pro-Russian Telegram channels. This one-minute video has no voiceover: it is accompanied by music, has French subtitles and LeFigaro logo.
The video is edited from publicly available and stock photos that in no way confirm the fact that such a statement was made. Among them are a photo of Edgar Rimaykun Inga from the Pope’s summer residence in Castel Gandolfo, taken on Jul. 20, 2025; a photo of Moshe Sebbag, rabbi of the Great Synagogue of Paris, from a July 2025 news article about the life of the Jewish community in France and the rise of anti-Semitism; an archive photo of Andrew Parsons, President of the International Paralympic Committee, taken during the closing ceremony of the Paralympic Games in Paris on Sep. 8, 2024, etc.
Finally, we looked into the powers the personal secretary to the Pope has. Their area of responsibility is administrative and organizational support for the Pope, not communication with the media. The person in this position accompanies the Pope during official events, plans his schedule, coordinates meetings and trips, prepares documents, handles correspondence, and provides organizational support. Unlike the press secretary, who heads the Holy See’s press office and communicates with the media on behalf of the Vatican, the Pope’s personal secretary has a low level of publicity.
In a comment on the dissemination of information about the alleged statement by the Pope’s personal secretary, the coordinator of the Ukrainian edition of Vatican News, Father Taras Kotsur, confirmed to Gwara that the Pope’s secretary is not a public figure and that there were no statements of his commenting on Ukrainian officials’ boycott of 2026 Paraolympics in any language on the Internet.
Therefore, the video from the supposed Le Figaro with a statement by Edgar Rimaykun Inga is fabricated. Creators used a method typical for Russian propaganda, namely, composing a video sequence from publicly available images and adding the logo of an famous foreign media to the slideshow. Such fakes are created to promote the narrative of the alleged “radicalism” of the Ukrainian government, as well as to present Ukraine’s stance on the participation of Russians in international sports competitions as manifestations of “Nazism” or “intolerance,” rather than as the political position of a state opposing the military aggression of the Russian army.
Conclusion: Fake
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