Facebook apologized Saturday for a distasteful mistranslation of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s name from Burmese language posts during his visit to Myanmar.
As his name appeared on Facebook during his two-day visit to Maynmar’s Capital Naypidaw as “Mr Shithole”; the automatic translation feature on Facebook. This visit was the first made by a Chinese leader in almost two decades.
This scandalous error appeared most notably on the official Facebook page of Myanmar’s civilian leader; Aung San Suu Kyi.
“Mr Shithole, President of China arrives at 4 PM,” said a translated announcement posted earlier Saturday.
“President of China, Mr. Shithole, signed a guest record of the house of representatives,” it continued.
A Facebook spokesperson told AFP the social platform “has fixed the issue regarding Burmese to English translations” on their site.
“We sincerely apologise for the offence this has caused,” they said in an emailed statement.
The company said it was unable to give any further details about whether the embarrassing error was due to a hack, software issues or something else.
Facebook, which is the most popular site for news, entertainment and chat, in addition for being a tribune for politicians and government agencies for statements and announcements, is restricted in China.
