Prominent human rights lawyer Eric Paulsen has denied allegations of spreading doctored photos of yesterday’s rally on Facebook .

The Lawyers for Liberty co-founder lodged a police report at the Petaling Jaya police district headquarters today, urging the police to investigate those who had made the allegations against him on various social media platforms.

“I had denied it immediately on my Twitter page but upon checking, I found that it has already been spread far and wide.

“So on Facebook , Twitter , and websites that are closely linked to Umno, they do not care whether it is true or false, only that the slander against me continues. That’s why I had to lodge a police report,” he told reporters outside the district police headquarters, after giving his statement to the police.

Yesterday during the rally, a collage of two photos was circulated on various social media platforms, one of which was alleged to be a screenshot from Paulsen’s Facebook page.

It showed him supposedly chastising Himpunan Rakyat Bersatu supporters and rallying Chinese Malaysians to respond with a show of power, while commenting on the doctored photo of the rally’s supporters.

The screenshot of the Facebook post was shown alongside what is purported to be the original photograph from the rally, and the caption, “Eric Paulsen edited photographs and slanders red shirt demonstrators’.

The original photo shows the banner carried by the protestors reading, “The people are united in opposing the insults against Islam as the religion of the federation”, whereas the edited version contained racial slurs against the Chinese and says they should die.

Paulsen decries the screenshot of the Facebook post as a fabrication, saying that he had never made such a posting.

He urged the police to investigate those responsible for spreading the photo, including the Facebook pages of Papagomo, and Friends of BN – Barisan Nasional; the Twitter account of Ramesh Rao AKS; the blogs Theunspinners , and Theflyingkick , and the website Mynewshub.cc , among others.

“After my statement was recorded by the investigating officer, the matter will be investigated and forwarded to the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC). I am prepared to cooperate with MCMC,” he told reporters.