THE Chinese photographer who forged an award-winning photograph has apologized for his behavior.

Monday's People's Day reported that Zhang Liang, a former photographer for the Harbin Daily, admitted he had added a pigeon to a photo using Photoshop software. The photo was taken in February 2004 and showed pigeons receiving bird flu vaccine shots from medical workers in front of Sophia Cathedral in Harbin.

The photo won the top prize in the first China International Press Photo Contest, held by the Photojournalist Society of China (PSC) in 2005.

"I would like to apologize to the public," said Zhang, who was dismissed from the Harbin Daily four days ago.

Zhang said he copied the pigeon in the top right corner of his photo and pasted it in the top left corner.

"I did it to make the photo perfect," Zhang was quoted by the newspaper. "It is the first time I have done things to perfect a picture with computer technology and I did it only once."

Last Thursday, the PSC cancelled the award granted to Zhang's photo after an expert panel confirmed it had been forged.

But the society has been criticized for being slow on the uptake.

The photo was first questioned online last April by netizens and Xu Lin, a PSC official.

Late last month, Jiang Duo, one of the contest judges and former PSC vice chairman, quit because of the society's ambiguous attitude toward the forgery accusation.

Jiang apologized online for not being able to identify the forgery, while acknowledging the photo was a fake.

"It is a heart-breaking choice. But I made up my mind because the society I founded is tolerating cheating," he said in a personal blog.

But Hu Ying, secretary-general of the PSC and also a member of the contest panel, denied that the PSC had delayed the probe on the photo.

"The PSC has placed great importance on this event. The investigation progressed slowly because of a busy schedule in the latter half of last year," he said.

(Xinhua)