Actor Charlie Sheen has defended remarks suggesting he hopes US president-elect Donald Trump will be the next celebrity to die.

The former Two And A Half Men star posted a message on Twitter which read: “Dear God, Trump next please!” shortly after the death of actress Debbie Reynolds was announced.

He signed off the tweet with an emoji showing a hand with its middle finger sticking up.

After a number of news reports were published about his tweet, Charlie, 51, posted a second message on his Twitter account defending his comments.

He wrote: “The media’s reaction to last night’s tweet is inanely emblematic of the panoramic timorousness draped vastly and wantonly across any and all expressions of hope or joy that we now dare to publish or impart.

“Oh and by the way, I was talking to God, not you.”

Charlie, who revealed last year he was HIV positive, had said in June he would support Trump if he was elected.

In an interview with Piers Morgan at an event in London, he said: “I think people just responded to something different, something fresh, something maverick, something innovative on some level.

“If he gets in I’ve got to support him and hope he does the best job he can, and if he doesn’t, then man – that was a hell of a run.”

Charlie Sheen (Ian West/PA)Charlie Sheen (Ian West/PA)

Singin’ In The Rain star Debbie, 84, died from a suspected stroke on Wednesday, just a day after the death of her daughter, actress Carrie Fisher.

Carrie, who shot to fame as Princess Leia in Star Wars, died in hospital aged 60 after suffering a heart attack on a transatlantic flight from London to Los Angeles.

Charlie has made headlines for his off-screen antics in recent years including a series of rambling public appearances in 2011 in which he declared he possessed “tiger blood” and “Adonis DNA”.