Chile’s President fined for no-mask selfie

(FASTNEWS | COLOMBO) –  Chilean President Sebastián Piñera has been fined $3,500 (£2,588) for breaching coronavirus rules by posing for a selfie with no facemask on.

Mr Piñera apologised after the photo of him with a woman – also without a mask – went viral earlier this month.

The president admitted he should have worn a mask when the woman requested a photo on a beach near his home in the town of Cachagua.

Chile has strict rules about wearing masks in public.

Violations of the mask law are punishable with penalties that include fines and even jail terms.

Coronavirus cases are on the rise in Chile, which has seen among the highest number of cases and deaths related to the disease in Latin America.

The country has recorded 581,135 infections and 16,051 deaths to date, according to a tally kept by Johns Hopkins University in the US.