McDonald’s in Portugal has apologised for using the slogan “Sundae Bloody Sundae” in a Halloween campaign for its ice-cream puddings.

It appears the chain decided to celebrate the spooky season with a two-for-one offer on the strawberry dessert and a nod to the early U2 song Sunday Bloody Sunday.

On Thursday it said the campaign had been pulled and it had never been intended as “an insensitive reference” to Bloody Sunday, when British paratroopers shot demonstrators at a civil rights march in the Bogside area of Derry, Northern Ireland, in January 1972. Thirteen men were killed, while a 14th man subsequently died of his wounds following one of the darkest days of the Troubles.

Portugal is cancelled. pic.twitter.com/X1egoGRq9j — MyLimes Na gCopaleen (@bigmonsterlove) October 30, 2019

In a statement issued to the Guardian, McDonald’s Portugal said: “When promoting its Halloween Sundae ice cream, McDonald’s Portugal developed a local market activation for a small number of its restaurants in Portugal.

“The campaign was intended as a celebration of Halloween, not as an insensitive reference to any historical event or to upset or insult anyone in any way. We sincerely apologise for any offence or distress this may have caused.”

It said all related promotional material had now been removed from its restaurants.

McDonald’s is not the first company to inadvertently invoke painful chapters in Irish and British history. In 2006 the US firm Ben & Jerry apologised to Irish consumers after it launched Black and Tan ice-cream.

The firm said the flavour had been inspired by the classic mixture of stout and pale ale, but customers were quick to point out the name had far grimmer associations. The Black and Tans were an irregular force of British ex-servicemen recruited and deployed during the Irish war of independence, where they quickly developed a reputation for brutality.

An earlier Bloody Sunday took place in Dublin on 21 November 1920, when members of the Black and Tans opened fire on crowds gathered to watch a Gaelic football match at Croke Park, killing 14 people.

In 2012, Nike apologised for nicknaming a pair of skate shoes “The Black and Tan”, saying it had been “unofficially named by some using a phrase that can be viewed as inappropriate and insensitive”.