IN an embarrassing gaffe today, the US State Department appeared to show it still thought that Singapore is a part of Malaysia.

On the transcript of a press briefing that US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo gave yesterday, the hotel venue was listed as “JW Marriott, Singapore, Malaysia” on the department’s official website.

The mistake was only rectified at about 3.00pm today.

US President Donald Trump is in Singapore to hold talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. The leaders are expected to be discussing terms to end Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons and missile programmes in return for diplomatic and economic incentives.

In response to a copy of the uncorrected transcript which was shared today by a Twitter user named Chun Han Wong, social media users mocked the apparent lack of geographical and diplomatic knowledge by the US State Department.

“The US pursues reunification… of the Malay Peninsula,” joked Chun Han Wong.

“Hell hath no fury than Singaporeans scorned (by calling them Malaysians)!,” wrote another Twitter user William Chong.

Singapore had left the 1963 federation of Malaysia in 1965 to form the independent Republic of Singapore. – June 12, 2018.