Host under fire over China joke

THE White House has weighed in on a petition calling for the government to crack down on Jimmy Kimmel Live .

The TV talk show sparked a furore in China in October with a joke about killing Chinese people to avoid paying down US debt to the country.

More than 105000 people signed a White House petition calling for an apology after the show, broadcast on ABC, included a segment where Kimmel asked a group of children how the US should pay back the $1.3-trillion (R13.8-trillion) it owes to China, the world's second-largest economy.

A six-year-old said: "Kill everyone in China." Kimmel replied: "That's an interesting idea."

The White House noted that ABC and Kimmel have "already apologised independently" and said that cutting the show would go against freedom of speech.