An Ecuadorean judge ruled that El Universo newspaper violated the privacy of children by “publishing photographs of underage children with President Rafael Correa,” the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas reported.
El Universo must pay a $500 fine even though the newspaper wrote in its own report it had “permission to publish,” according to a Google Translate. The International Freedom of Expression Exchange reported that the photo was accused of breaking a tenet of Ecuador’s Children and Adolescents Code barring “children or adolescents in political or religious proselytizing programs or spectacles.”
The article in question, from Aug. 12, 2012, now carries the photo with the children’s faces blurred, iMediaEthics notes.
iMediaEthics has written previously about Correa’s libel lawsuits against journalists at El Universo.