Britain apologises for map blunder

The British High Commission on Tuesday apologised for a UK defence ministry video which displayed a truncated map of Cyprus that did not include the north or the British bases, prompting an outcry.

In a statement posted on its Facebook page, the High Commission spoke of a design error and said that it had contacted the government of Cyprus to explain what had happened.

In its statement, the High Commission said: “The UK Ministry of Defence recently released a video regarding Ukraine which depicted Cyprus incorrectly. This was a design error and does not reflect any change in UK policy toward the Republic of Cyprus, a valued friend and partner of the UK.”

And it added: “A revised version of the video has now been issued, with a corrected map. The UK Government has contacted the Government of Cyprus to explain what happened. We have made clear that we regret the offence that this error has caused. We have taken steps to ensure that there is no repeat.”

On Monday, Disy issued a statement saying it expected the government to take the necessary steps over the 32-second video, which was quickly withdrawn, but not before some outlets managed to save and reproduce it.

The video was trying to depict all of the countries that have condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and those that didn’t.

But because the video is so short, it flashes only a map of the country and its flag. The Cyprus map is distorted without the Turkish-occupied north and with the chunks of the British bases missing. Blink and it would be easy to miss.

Other political parties also condemned the UK over the video with Socialist Edek saying the move by the British was “another confirmation of the suspicious and subversive role of Britain to the detriment of the Republic of Cyprus”.

Some media in the north did not let it slide either and played up the fact that the ‘TRNC’ was excluded, deducing that the UK had finally officially recognised the reality in Cyprus.

Sigmalive had reproduced the video here: