Open Url not working (for me) in mobile, just desktop

Hello All!
I have an extremely simple html5 map thing im working on, am just simply trying to make a tap on a image in mobile open a new browser window with an Url. The urls are various existing articles online related to places on the map. Am using the Open URL extension

It works perfectly on desktop, - not at all on a iphone in safari / Firefox, or Chrome.

After some testing it seems really obvious this is a popup blocker kinda problem, Chrome notifies me it has stopped a popup-, if i allow, then all works correctly.

THE QUESTION - Is there any workaround for this that will work with most browsers on mobile?

OR do i just gotta punt and do something else?

thanks for your time
jd

Did you create a real apk build for a test?