CNN corrects gaffe which says Singapore is not a country

Singapore—Maybe the interns for CNN’s website didn’t get their morning coffee, as that may explain why one article published on Tuesday (Oct 7) contained at least three glaring errors, including a parenthetical remark that Singapore is (*Not a country*).

Adding insult to injury, the article listed Sint Maarten among “Countries with fewer new cases of coronavirus than the White House in the past 24 hours,” failing to note that it’s still part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It also misspelled Papua as ‘Papau New Guinea.’

Some netizens also pointed out that the article disregarded Taiwan as a country with fewer Covid cases than the White House.

Fortunately, the global news site issued a correction at the end of the article, entitled “Trump’s erratic behavior continues as he halts stimulus talks and spreads falsehoods on pandemic,” a short while later.

It read, “CORRECTION: A chart previously published in this article incorrectly stated Singapore was not a country. The chart has been removed.”

But netizens had already taken screenshots of the gaffe, as local activist Kirsten Han did, posting them on social media. Ms Han simply captioned her Tweet with, “Hi @CNN, what is happening here”.

Hi @CNN, what is happening here pic.twitter.com/jN7xD9e8DM

— Kirsten Han 韩俐颖 (@kixes) October 7, 2020

Singapore’s “Blogfather” Lee Kin Mun, aka Mr Brown, was a little more snarky, asking the news site, “Eh @CNN , you failed Geography issit?”

Eh @CNN, you failed Geography issit? pic.twitter.com/iPwBIM38Cc

— mrbrown (@mrbrown) October 7, 2020

Netizens who poked fun at CNN’s error joked that Singapore is either part of China, or belongs to Malaysia.

And it seems that a number of netizens could not help bringing up Taiwan:

-/TISG