US State Department Apologises For AI Map Blunder In Africa

A map used by a senior US official at an international AIDS conference in Rio de Janeiro drew widespread criticism this week after it showed Nigeria as landlocked and placed Ivory Coast in East Africa rather than West Africa, among several other errors that left six African countries unrecognizable or misplaced entirely.

The flawed map appeared during a State Department slide presentation on Washington’s HIV funding programs, delivered Sunday at the conference. The department called it “an unfortunate error,” saying a staff member had hastily altered the slide deck ahead of the presentation. A spokesperson said the department took full responsibility for the confusion it caused attendees, including African partners.

The mistake came to light after HIV/AIDS expert Emily Bass posted a photo of the slide to her Substack newsletter, triggering strong backlash online. A Reuters analysis of the image found a watermark indicating it had been generated using artificial intelligence tools. OpenAI told Reuters it was looking into the matter. Of the six countries highlighted on the map, Nigeria, Mozambique, and Ivory Coast were all placed incorrectly, while Malawi and Uganda appeared roughly in the right location but with distorted shapes; Cameroon was labeled but not actually linked to any country outline on the map.

The presentation was given by a senior official overseeing the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), the US government’s flagship global HIV initiative. Senate Foreign Relations Committee ranking member Jeanne Shaheen criticized the episode on social media, tying it to the State Department’s loss of career experts and reliance on AI. Former State Department official Cameron Hudson similarly called the mistake embarrassing, attributing it to inexperienced staff working without adequate oversight.

The error emerged during the 26th International AIDS Conference, held this week in Rio de Janeiro, at a time when the US has sharply cut foreign aid spending following President Trump’s return to office last year. Despite the controversy, the State Department maintained that discussions at the conference remained substantive and reaffirmed its commitment to fighting HIV/AIDS both in Africa and globally.

The incident comes as the Trump administration continues restructuring US global health assistance. While PEPFAR’s core treatment programs have largely resumed after last year’s aid cuts, the US is pulling back funding in areas like prevention and disease surveillance, and plans to wind the program down entirely in South Africa.