The Mail Online—one of the world’s most popular news websites—on Wednesday falsely reported that a harrowing video of a Cambodian toddler being tortured with a taser was a Rohingya child being abused by a Burmese soldier.
The story, which ran with the headline, “Heartbreaking images show ‘Rohingya toddler tortured with a stun gun by laughing Burmese soldier’ as Burma continues crackdown on the country’s Muslim minority,” cited an “unverified video” posted online as its source.
The story by Dave Burke was later removed with no explanation from the Daily Mail’s website.
The video was actually of a Cambodian toddler being tortured, allegedly by a Vietnamese national identified by police as Nguyen Thanh Dung, which went viral on Tuesday and caused national uproar.
The Rohingya are a Muslim minority who are subject to widespread persecution at the hands of authorities in Burma’s Rakhine state.
Recently, there have been accusations of state-sanctioned ethnic cleansing against the group, while Burmese leader Aung San Suu Kyi has come under widespread international criticism for shirking the issue.
The U.K.-based Mail Online did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
