United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) President Miroslav Lajcak has said that he will 'certainly think' about how to deal with erroneous use of pictures. The remark comes after Pakistan sought to take on India at the UNGA by trying to pass off a photo of a violence victim in Gaza as that of a Kashmiri girl.
Lajcak made the comment when asked if he would like to see 'some sort of factual baseline' set so that "when people make a mistake they correct it, not in terms of an opinion statement, but the use of a photograph." "I will certainly think about it."
Pakistan's Permanent Representative Maleeha Lodhi had on Saturday brandished the girl's photo, showing multiple pellet injuries on the face, to back her charges of Indian "atrocities" against civilians in Jammu and Kashmir.
But Pakistan immediately had egg on its face as the photo turned out to be that of 17-year-old Rawya Abu Jom, who was injured when two Israeli airstrikes hit her family's apartment in Gaza in 2014.
Lodhi was trying to counter External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj's blistering attack on Pakistan, describing the country as a "pre-eminent export factory for terror". On Monday, India displayed at the UN the picture of Lt. Umar Faiyaz and reminded the world how the young Kashmiri officer was brutally tortured and killed by Pakistan-sponsored terrorists in May 2017.
Photojournalist Heidi Levine who had taken the photo said she was shocked. "As you can imagine, I was very shocked to see my photograph misused and I am hoping that somehow this mistake was done by an assistant to Ms Lohdi," said the American freelance photojournalist.
Levine said that it is most disrespectful to claim that Rawya is the face of India. "This young woman is still suffering both psychologically and physically to recover from her injuries and the loss of family members," said Levine, who is based in Jerusalem and has worked as a professional photojournalist since 1983.
The Palestine girl's photo had been featured in many photo galleries online, including by the New York Times and the Guardian. But on Saturday, the official Twitter account of the Pakistani mission to the UN also tweeted it.
