It appears that actor John Cena has recently taken the responsibility of apologizing to China. Specifically, John Cena apologized for having called Taiwan a country in a recent interview he participated in for the upcoming film F9 aka Fast & Furious 9. He managed to issue the apology in Mandarin on Weibo.
The incident first occurred when John Cena was being interviewed on the Taiwanese broadcasting network TVBS. He explained that Taiwan would be “the first country to watch the film.” Since Taiwan isn’t actually a country, the comment caused offense, and John Cena soon apologized. As stated in the caption for his apology which was shared via Joe Xu on Twitter:
“John Cena apologized in Chinese on Sina Weibo after calling Taiwan a country during an interview promoting Fast & Furious 9”
The translation for the apology was conducted by South China Morning Post, and it was translated as the following:
“Hi China, I’m John Cena. I’m in the middle of Fast & Furious 9 promotions. I’m doing a lot of interviews. I made a mistake in one of my interviews.”
Cena continued, “Everyone was asking me if I could use Chinese – [movie] staff gave me a lot of information, so there was a lot of interviews and information.”
“I made one mistake. I have to say something very, very, very important now. I love and respect China and Chinese people. I’m very, very sorry about my mistake,” said Cena.
Finally, he concluded, “I apologize, I apologize, I’m very sorry. You must understand that I really love, really respect China and the Chinese people. My apologies. See you.”
John Cena apologized in Chinese on Sina Weibo after calling Taiwan a country during an interview promoting Fast & Furious 9 pic.twitter.com/dzRKIYgEzL
— Joe Yizhou Xu, PhD (@JoeXu) May 24, 2021
With this in mind, some users still aren’t pleased with the popular actor. In fact, they’ve stated the following via South China Morning Post:
“Please say in Chinese that Taiwan is part of China. Otherwise, we won’t accept it.”
Another user called the apology “nonsense.”
“Then you should say Taiwan is China’s! What you have said in the video is nonsense. You can’t take benefits from China, but in the meantime, do things to harm China’s interests.”
One other user warned John Cena about “carelessly” talking “about China’s territory.”
“I like you. I think you truly love China. Don’t talk carelessly again about China’s territory and sovereignty.”
In any case, Fast & Furious 9 has already been released to theaters in China – with a release date in the United States scheduled for June 25, 2021.