Facebook succumbs to public pressure and reinstates napalm girl photo

FACEBOOK has backed down from their censorship of the iconic napalm girl photo and have reinstated the picture after a massive public backlash.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning napalm girl image by Nick Ut was at the centre of a heated debate about freedom of speech in Norway after Facebook deleted it from a Norwegian author's page. Picture: Cornelius Poppe, NTB scanpix via AP

FACEBOOK is reinstating a Vietnam War-era photo of a naked girl fleeing a napalm attack, after a public outcry over its removal of the image including harsh criticism from Norway’s prime minister.

In a clash between a democratically elected leader and the social media giant over how to patrol the internet, Norway Prime Minister Erna Solberg said Facebook was editing history by erasing images of the iconic 1972 “Napalm Girl” photograph, which showed children running from a bombed village. The company initially said the photo violated its Community Standards barring child nudity on the site.

Terrified children, including 9-year-old Kim Phuc, centre, as they run down Route 1 near Trang Bang after an aerial napalm attack on suspected Viet Cong hiding places. Picture: AP/Nick Ut

“After hearing from our community, we looked again at how our Community Standards were applied in this case,” Facebook said in a later statement, adding it recognised “the history and global importance of this image in documenting a particular moment in time”.

Solberg posted the iconic “Napalm Girl” news photograph on her Facebook page after the company had deleted it from sites of Norwegian authors and the daily Aftenposten.

Facebook had also removed the photo from the page of the woman who had been photographed as a girl.

Espen Egil Hansen, editor-in-chief and CEO of Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten wrote an open letter to founder and CEO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, accusing him of threatening the freedom of speech and abusing power after deleting the iconic picture. Picture: AFP/NTB Scanpix/Erik JOHANSEN

Captured by Pulitzer Prize-winner Nick Ut of the Associated Press, the image of screaming children running from a napalm attack shows a naked nine-year-old girl at its centre.

Solberg said Facebook’s ban put unacceptable limits on freedom of speech. Protesting Facebook’s move, Solberg re-posted the photo with a black square covering the naked girl, and published a range of other historic images blacking over faces of people such as Ronald Reagan or Winston Churchill. She also posted a version of the “Tank Man” image from the 1989 protests in China’s Tiananmen Square, with a black square covering a man standing in front of a row of army tanks.