Air parade clips are wrongly portrayed as Indonesia's Russian army

When rumors of Russia's alleged military aircraft stationed in Indonesia's Papua province claimed that both countries denied it, video surfaced, falsely claiming it showed Russian aircraft arrived in Southeast Asian countries in April 2025. The video was previously released in the Russian Military St. Petersburg by 2022.

Indonesian language text covers Indonesian language text in a Tiktok video on April 16, 2025: “The arrival of Russian bombers.” “These Russian bombers will maintain security in Papua in the intervention of the United States and Australia.”

The post’s headline similarly claimed that the aircraft was designed to help stop potential attacks in Papua province located near the northern tip of Australia.

Featured video shows fighter planes flying in formations, followed by a clip of President Prabowo Spenyanto meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

In a defense publication reported on April 14 that Moscow asked Jakarta to allow Russian aircraft to be stationed in a military facility in Papua (archived link).

Officials in both countries denied the claim, according to a report by the state-run Antara News Agency in Indonesia.

Comments about the post show that some people think the clip shows the arrival of Russian troops. One person wrote: “Welcome, Russia.

However, a combination of reverse image and keyword searches on Google found that the video was uploaded on YouTube on August 1, 2022 with the title: “TU-95 Strategic Bomber – Bomber Carrier – Naval Day in St. Petersburg, Russia” (archive link).

Another clip shared on July 31, 2022 also shows similar aircraft parades from different angles (archive links).

Further searches also show footage of meeting Putin on July 31, 2024 after Prabowo was elected president but still served as defense minister.

AFP released a picture showing the same scene of the day (archive link).

Both the Russian and Indonesian governments have released photos of the meeting (archived here and here).