Did a former US President, Barack Obama, unveil a portrait photo of the Angkor Wat temple?

After the news that Cambodia's Angkor Wat temple has become the eighth wonder of the world, a video clip showing former US President Barack Obama posing for a photo of Angkor Wat Posted on several Facebook pages, the video link above has been widely shared, and there were mixed expressions and reactions as well. However, we found that this video was attached with an alteration.

This is about our investigation of this claim.

Social Media Claim

On November 24, 2023, a Facebook page posted a video clip showing the former US president posing for a photo with the Angkor Wat temple, which is located in Siem Reap province, Cambodia. This temple recently defeated Pompeii and became the eighth wonder of the world.

The video clip above has been re-shared several times, along with a variety of comments and reactions from social media users who speak Khmer.

Below is the full video clip posted on social media with the caption, “Congratulations on Angkor Wat becoming the eighth wonder of the world”.

Facebook Post | Archived Link

Video clips with such claims have been posted and found on many Facebook pages. Please see the full claim via the link here (archived link) and here (archived link).

Fact Check

Fact Crescendo Cambodia reviewed and verified the above claim through the Google Reverse Image Search application, which brings us to the following facts:

A video clip with the exact same aspect and format was released by CNN on its YouTube video site on February 12, 2018. The same website does not confirm that this is the view of former President Obama standing to show photos of the Angkor Wat temples recently.

Instead, here is a view of his paintings at the Smithsonian's National Gallery in Washington, DC, in February 2018.

The complete CNN video footage is seen here.

CNN | Archived Link

The same case was also reported and published by the NBC News website on February 12, 2018, without showing the view of the former US President displaying a portrait photo with the temple of Angkor, the ancient temple of Cambodia, at all.

The following is a photo from the news website above that reads, “Obama is on display at the National Gallery”.

NBC News | Archived Link

Below is a comparison of the photos attached to the video clip above that were cut.

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You may find the details of this fact-check in Khmer language here as well.

Conclusion

Fact Crescendo Cambodia found the claim, as mentioned above, to be false. This video shows former US President Obama unveiling his portrait at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery in Washington in February 2018.