In what must be one of the cruellest pranks to play on a 13-year-old, a Cambodian television programme tricked a girl into thinking she was about to meet her long lost mother.

After a tense build up on the Mother's Day special, in which a tearful Autumn Allen reportedly explained it would be a "dream come true" to be reunited after seven years apart, she was confronted by a male comedian in drag.

Allen, a young singer who had emigrated to the US with her father when she was six, actually took the prank incredibly well, appearing to laugh and joke along with the presenters on-stage.

Nevertheless, viewers of the Penh Chet Ort ('Like it or Not') variety show were quick to express their disgust on social media, according to the Phnom Penh Post.

Producers of the programme subsequently issued an apology which Allen posted on her Facebook page:

A letter of apology from MYTV. Posted by Autumn Allen on Monday, 11 May 2015

Watch a clip of Penh Chet Ort from YouTube below:



