The “never before seen” photograph shows Jackson with his arm around the rapper. It's not clear when the image was taken.

P Diddy accompanied the picture with a message that said: “Never before seen photo of me and Mike chilling.”

But the rapper was later forced to post another image of the pair after some of his followers claimed the first had been faked.

“I can't believe y'all think this picture is photoshopped; I'm going to post two more pictures today to prove it,” he wrote.

P Diddy was one of the first high profile celebrity Twitter users to pay tribute to Jackson after his death last month.

"Michael Jackson showed me that you can actually see the beat,” he wrote on June 25.

“He made the music come to life!! He made me believe in magic. I will miss him!"

(by Jason Gregory)