An image shows a World War Two veteran crying during a parade because he is the last survivor of his battle group.
This is a picture of man taken during a military parade in Russia in 2007. His identity and the reason for his tears is unknown and has been the subject of much online debate.
A photo showing a man, adorned with military medals and crying as he appears to walk in a parade has been shared thousands of times on Facebook.
According to the text on the photo, the man is crying as he is the last veteran in his World War Two battle group.
However, the photo has been a source of debate for years as people have disputed the reason for the man’s display of sadness.
According to the Telegraph and BBC Trending, the photo was taken in St Petersburg, Russia in 2007 during a World War Two victory parade. Both publications confirmed this with the picture’s photographer Aleksandr Petrosyan.
Petrosyan also told the Telegraph that the man wasn’t crying because he was the last remaining member of his group, but because he could not catch up with a column of other veterans. Mr Petrosyan also told the Telegraph he didn’t speak directly to the man.
And the BBC cites Dr Igor Sutyagin, a Russian military historian, to confirm that one of the medals the man is wearing is "The Order of the Patriotic War", an award given to those who played a role in the Soviet Army in World War Two.
However, attempts to find the man have reportedly been unsuccessful, so we have been unable to confirm the man’s background.
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as mixture as it fails to provide accurate context to the photo.
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