Required reading for Maltese people who think politicians and their fellow-travellers should be protected from mockery

Agence France-Presse released an unflattering (but in a curious way, humanly charming) photograph of Francois Hollande. The result was a sort of chaos, with the picture going viral on social media. AFP withdrew the picture – too late, though – and was accused of succumbing to pressure from Hollande’s office.

Hollande’s advisers had clearly not heard of the ‘Streisand effect’, but they’ve probably become intimately familiar with it in the last 24 hours.

The BBC reports:

News agency Agence France-Presse has said it was wrong to withdraw an unflattering picture of French leader Francois Hollande after it was widely posted on social media sites.

In a blog post, AFP’s global news director Philippe Massonnet says: “With the benefit of hindsight we see that the decision to retract the photo was clearly an error.

“The order to kill the photo ironically breathed new life into this saga, and led to the image being massively shared across social networks in France, often accompanied by unkind comments about AFP.”

Since coming to office, Mr Hollande has struggled to boost his popularity, earning the nickname Flanby (a wobbly caramel pudding). Newspapers described his appearance in Tuesday’s image as “gormless” or “simple-minded”.