The BBC has apologised for a news report which contained a racist term.
An offensive slur was used in a news report about a racially aggravated attack in Bristol.
The broadcaster initially defended the use of the slur, which was originally aired on the regional service Points West before being repeated on the national BBC News channel.
More than 180,000 complaints were made to the BBC, and now its Director-General Lord Hall has issued an apology.
Lord Hall said in an email sent to all BBC staff: “This morning I brought together a group of BBC colleagues to discuss our news coverage of the recent shocking attack on an NHS worker. I wanted us to look at the issues raised by the reporting and the strength of feeling surrounding it.
“We are proud of the BBC’s values of inclusion and respect, and have reflected long and hard on what people have had to say about the use of the n-word and all racist language both inside and outside the organisation.
“It should be clear that the BBC’s intention was to highlight an alleged racist attack. This is important journalism which the BBC should be reporting on and we will continue to do so.
“Yet despite these good intentions, I recognise that we have ended up creating distress amongst many people.
“The BBC now accepts that we should have taken a different approach at the time of broadcast and we are very sorry for that. We will now be strengthening our guidance on offensive language across our output.
“Every organisation should be able to acknowledge when it has made a mistake. We made one here. It is important for us to listen – and also to learn. And that is what we will continue to do.”
On Saturday, BBC Radio 1xtra presenter Sideman announced that he was quitting the corporation over the broadcast.
Announcing the move on social media, he said the news report represented an “error of judgement”, adding it “feels like a slap in the face to our community”.
