Yah-oops: Yahoo! News Site in Olympic Mix-up

The photographs were everything the Chinese authorities might hope to see on an overseas website: tourists, performers and even Olympic mascots celebrating the run-up to the Games in Tiananmen Square, at the heart of the capital.

The headline must have been rather less welcome. Above a picture gallery of musicians, acrobats and other entertainers, it read: "Tiananmen Square Massacre Remembered."

It is not clear how the words came to appear on Yahoo!'s news site and the problem may lie with an automated gallery based on keywords. But the bizarre juxtaposition was on display for at least 24 hours and was still evident yesterday evening.

It was even visible from Beijing itself, presumably thanks in part to the government's relaxation of internet censorship this week. It has unblocked access to long-barred material - including detailed coverage of the bloody crackdown on democracy protests in 1989 - after coming under pressure from the International Olympic Committee. Organizers had promised to allow journalists "free and unfettered" reporting.

Some sites were still off-limits last night. While Amnesty International's main website could be accessed, its dedicated site the china debate.org could not be reached.

Yahoo! previously found itself at the center of controversy over the ethical challenges faced by internet companies in China after a journalist was jailed for emailing an overseas group a government order banning coverage of the anniversary of the Tiananmen protests.

Last year its chief executive, Jerry Yang, personally apologized to the family of Shi Tao, who sent the message under a pseudonym using a Yahoo! account. The firm said it did not know the case related to a political dissident or journalist when it provided email information to the authorities. Beijing's state security bureau had told Yahoo it was investigating the illegal provision of "state secrets".

Yahoo! subsequently sold a majority stake in its Chinese operation to a local company and created a human rights fund to support political dissidents.

In a statement last night Yahoo! said: "Yahoo! News slideshows are an automated feature, which add news images to topical albums based on specific words in the photo titles and captions. In this case, the 'Tiananmen Square massacre remembered' slideshow was created following memorial services on the anniversary of the event, and the slideshow was set up to automatically add photos with the term 'Tiananmen' in the photo caption. Given that the slideshow is no longer featuring photos from the memorial services, Yahoo! News has updated the slideshow title to 'Tiananmen Square'."