BBC uses Iraq war photo for Syria massacre

The photo in question was taken over nine years earlier by Italian photojournalist Marco Di Lauro and shows an Iraqi child jumping over a line of hundreds of corpses, in a school where the bodies had been transported from a mass grave to be identified. The BBC caption on the picture stated that the photo had been received from an activist.

A few minutes after the publication of the image photographer Di Lauro posted a message on his Facebook page that triggered thousands of responses.

The BBC site does not have the photo posted anymore however no notice was posted with the story about the error by the British media.

Syrians have said that the western propaganda is aimed at tarnishing the image of the Syrian government.

The BBC did apologize and have since retracted that picture but it remains unclear why the British media picked this image when it could have chosen from a pool of photographs from Syria.

This has become a trademark of media coverage of the 15-month unrest in Syria. In such cases, the media's responsibility lies not only in disseminating what information is available, but also acknowledging the challenges and limitations of reporting in a complex political environment.