The British Army has apologised after posting an image of a soldier with a “blacked up” face on social media.

The image, published on the Army’s official Twitter account, showed a soldier wearing black face-paint as part of his camouflage in a jungle.

The tweet, which was swiftly deleted, was described as “stupid” and “racist” by outraged social media users, while anti-racism campaigners said the force should feel "embarrassed".

An Army spokesman later said they could see how the tweet "may have been misinterpreted" and apologised.

The image was captioned with the words: “Being a soldier in the jungle requires a robust sense of humour”.