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Italian ‘took bare bottom snaps’ at Angkor temple

Three tourists, including an Italian, appeared in a Cambodian court on Monday accused of taking photographs of their bare bottoms inside the country's famed Angkor temple complex, an official said on Monday.

Published: 11 May 2015 13:56 CEST
Italian 'took bare bottom snaps' at Angkor temple
Three tourists, including an Italian, allegedly took photographs of their bare bottoms inside the country's famed Angkor temple complex,Photo: Dennis Jarvis

Two men – an Italian and Argentinian – and a Dutch woman, were arrested after a guard spotted them taking the cheeky pictures at one of the temples at the ancient site on Sunday.

"They were taking photos showing their bottoms," Long Kosal of the Apsara Authority – the government agency managing the Angkor complex – told AFP.

"Their action affects the value of our temples," Kosal said, adding they were sent to court in Siem Reap city over the alleged offensive activities.

Earlier this year, three French men and two American sisters were deported after they were convicted in two separate cases of taking naked photos inside Angkor temple complex.

They received a suspended six-month prison sentence on two charges – public exposure and making pornography – and will be banned from re-entering Cambodia for four years.

They were caught just days after a series of photos of Asian women posing nude at ancient Cambodian temples went viral online, outraging officials who vowed to step up efforts to prevent similar stunts.

The Angkor Archaeological Park, a world heritage site, contains the remains of the different capitals of the Khmer Empire, dating from the 9th to the 15th centuries, and is Cambodia's most popular tourist destination.

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French court orders Twitter to reveal anti-hate speech efforts

A French court has ordered Twitter to give activists full access to all its documents relating to efforts to combat racism, sexism and other forms of hate speech on the social network.

Published: 7 July 2021 10:03 CEST
French court orders Twitter to reveal anti-hate speech efforts
Photo: Alastair Pike | AFP

Six anti-discrimination groups had taken Twitter to court in France last year, accusing the US social media giant of “long-term and persistent” failures in blocking hateful comments from the site.

The Paris court ordered Twitter to grant the campaign groups full access to all documents relating to the company’s efforts to combat hate speech since May 2020. The ruling applies to Twitter’s global operation, not just France.

Twitter must hand over “all administrative, contractual, technical or commercial documents” detailing the resources it has assigned to fighting homophobic, racist and sexist discourse on the site, as well as “condoning crimes against humanity”.

The San Francisco-based company was given two months to comply with the ruling, which also said it must reveal how many moderators it employs in France to examine posts flagged as hateful, and data on the posts they process.

The ruling was welcomed by the Union of French Jewish Students (UEJF), one of the groups that had taken the social media giant to court.

“Twitter will finally have to take responsibility, stop equivocating and put ethics before profit and international expansion,” the UEJF said in a statement on its website.

Twitter’s hateful conduct policy bans users from promoting violence, or threatening or attacking people based on their race, religion, gender identity or disability, among other forms of discrimination.

Like other social media businesses it allows users to report posts they believe are hateful, and employs moderators to vet the content.

But anti-discrimination groups have long complained that holes in the policy allow hateful comments to stay online in many cases.

French prosecutors on Tuesday said they have opened an investigation into a wave of racist comments posted on Twitter aimed at members of the country’s national football team.

The comments, notably targeting Paris Saint-Germain star Kylian Mbappe, were posted after France was eliminated from the Euro 2020 tournament last week.

France has also been having a wider public debate over how to balance the right to free speech with preventing hate speech, in the wake of the controversial case of a teenager known as Mila.

The 18-year-old sparked a furore last year when her videos, criticising Islam in vulgar terms, went viral on social media.

Thirteen people are on trial accused of subjecting her to such vicious harassment that she was forced to leave school and was placed under police protection.

While President Emmanuel Macron is among those who have defended her right to blaspheme, left-wing critics say her original remarks amounted to hate speech against Muslims.

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