After Pakistan army chief General Syed Asim Munir held talks with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman during an official visit to the Gulf kingdom in November 2024, a video appearing to show the army chief touching his host’s knee was shared in social media posts. The video, however, was originally posted by a TikTok account that labelled it as AI-generated content. Clips from the meeting shared by Saudi state media also do not show any such interaction taking place.
The video was shared on November 7, 2024, in an Urdu-language X post that accuses army chief General Syed Asim Munir of disrespecting Pakistani women yet “falling to others’ feet when abroad”.
The accompanying clip, which was viewed more than 370,000 times, appears to show the army chief reaching over to touch the knee of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Touching someone else’s knee is considered an expression of respect in Pakistan; government officials will sometimes touch the knee of a political opponent or ally to solicit their support (archived link).
The Urdu word “bachalo (save me)” is superimposed in the top-left of the clip, while “Bilal Ai” is written in the top-right.
The video was shared by an account which has previously posted content in support of Pakistan’s jailed former prime minister Imran Khan, who fell out with the country’s influential military establishment just prior to his ouster in April 2022 (archived link).
The military looms large over Pakistan’s political landscape, with generals having run the country for nearly half its history since partition from India in 1947.
Screenshot of the false X post, captured on November 15, 2024
The same video was shared alongside similar claims elsewhere on X here, here and here.
It circulated after the Saudi crown prince welcomed the Pakistan army chief at the Royal Palace during an official visit on November 6.
According to the Pakistan military’s information wing (ISPR), the two discussed regional peace, defence and security cooperation and strategies for enhancing relations (archived link).
But the footage released by state media of the meeting does not show the supposed interaction circulating on social media.
‘AI content’
A keyword search on Google for “Bilal Ai” — the superimposed text on the falsely shared video — led to the same clip shared on a TikTok account bearing the same name (archived link).
The account’s bio says “AI content” as well as “Satire”.
The video was shared on the account on November 7, with the disclaimer: “Creator labelled as AI generated.”
According to TikTok, “creators apply this label themselves to indicate that their content was completely generated or significantly edited by AI” (archived link).
Below is a screenshot comparison between the video used in the false post (left) and the same video labelled as “AI generated” on TikTok (right):
Screenshot comparison between the video used in the false post (left) and the same video labelled as “AI generated” on TikTok (right)
A reverse image search on Google using keyframes from the AI-generated video led to a corresponding photo posted by the Saudi foreign ministry on X (archived link).
The same photo was also used in an article by Geo News and credited to ISPR (archived link).
The Geo News article also includes an embedded video showing footage from the meeting between the army chief and the Saudi crown prince taken from a slightly different angle, but at no point in the brief clip does Munir reach over to touch the knee of Saudi Arabia’s de facto leader.
AFP has previously debunked false posts circulating in Pakistan that used AI-generated content here and here.
