Ricky Gervais, the film and TV comic, has apologised to a mother of two Down’s Syndrome children after repeatedly using an abusive term in posts on social media networking site Twitter.

Mum Nicola Clarke was in tears confronting Gervais in a BBC Radio 2 chat show after telling him how her two daughters were regularly insulted by being called ‘mongs’ in public.

Gervais included the derogatory term in Tweets like ‘Good monging’ and ‘Two mongs don’t make a right.’

He contacted Ms Clarke after the show and apologised to her and her daughters, claiming he was naive and did not believe people would be so upsetting as referring to disabled people with the term.

Upset Twitter users lambasted Gervais for his behaviour – which he defended at first as a legitimate use of modern slang, claiming the word is in dictionaries meaning ‘dopey’ or ‘ignorant.’

An internet search of the term throw up entries in the Urban Dictionary as the first page mentioning the word – listing his interpretation as well as the Down’s Syndrome definition.

The comic also tweeted his apology, saying: “’Just to clarify for uptight people stuck in the past, the word mong means Down’s Syndrome about as much as the word gay means happy. I never use the word mong to mean anything to do with Downs Syndrome.”

In tweeting Ms Clarke, she said: “I now understand that you didn’t and wouldn’t intentionally hurt anyone. Do you understand why people got upset by it?”

Gervais responded: “I do now. Never dreamed that idiots still use that word aimed at people with Down’s Syndrome. Still find it hard to believe. I feel a mixture of confusion, anger, terror and disappointment. But mostly naive. Never meant the word like that and never would.”

Meanwhile, mobile technology giant Nokia is also red-faced over a translation of the name of the new Lumia handset in to Spanish.

‘Lumia’ means whore, streetwalker or prostitute in Spanish.