Sharon Stone has been dropped by cosmetics firm Christian Dior from its Chinese adverts following remarks she made about the recent earthquake, based on a report by BBC News.
The firm's Chinese office also issued a statement attributed to Stone, in which she apologised for saying the disaster could have been the result of "karma". In it, Stone said she was "deeply sorry" that her remarks, made in a TV interview last week, caused anguish. Stone made the controversial remarks at the Cannes Film Festival last week, leading to pledges by some Chinese cinemas not to show her films. "I'm not happy about the way the Chinese are treating the Tibetans because I don't think anyone should be unkind to anyone else," Stone told a Hong Kong TV crew.And then all this earthquake and all this stuff happened, and I thought, 'is that karma - when you're not nice that the bad things happen to you?'"
The quake struck south-west China on 12 May, and has claimed 68,000 lives.