Ministry Apologizes After Posting Burma Army Chief Photo Alongside Elephant Story
By The Irrawaddy 19 May 2017
RANGOON — The official Facebook page for Burma’s Ministry of Information (MOI) has apologized to the army’s Commander-in-Chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing after posting his picture alongside a story about a wounded elephant on Thursday morning.
The photo showed Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing and the Philippines’ armed forces chief Gen Eduardo Ano at the ASEAN Chiefs of Defense Forces Informal Meeting (ACDFIM) in Manila, with an article titled ‘A Wounded Wild Elephant was Found and Treated.’
In the story, the forestry department and police found a wounded elephant in the forest near a village in Thabeikkyin Township of Pyin Oo Lwin, Mandalay Division. The team treated the elephant’s injuries, including a wound from a poisoned arrow, and returned the animal to the forest.
The unfortunate juxtaposition was shared by social media users and prompted the MOI to apologize that night. Its website and newspapers released the correct pictures for both stories.
“We mistakenly published the commander-in-chief of the military’s photo in the news titled ‘A Wounded Wild Elephant was Found and Treated’ around 8 a.m. on May 18 on the MOI Webportal Myanmar Facebook page. We seriously apologize to the commander-in-chief for the mistake,” the apology read.
On May 11, the Facebook page published a photo-shopped photograph of US President Donald Trump holding an executive order imprinted with the words ‘James Comey You’re Fired!’
