American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, and Hawaiian Airlines have dropped the name "Taiwan" from their websites, although they have stopped short of referring to Taipei Taoyuan and other airports on the island as located in China.
The Beijing government of the People's Republic of China earlier issued an ultimatum to all airlines to stop referring to Taipei as part of Taiwan and instead refer to it as a part of the PRC. The deadline for the change was set for July 25, 2018.
While all four airlines have complied with the demand to drop the name "Taiwan" from their online booking engines, neither has started referring to Taipei as located in China. The airlines simply do not give any name of a country next to the city.
The PRC government said it was content with such a change. According to the authorities, a total of 44 airlines have changed the designation of Taipei.
The American airlines received counsel from the US State Department. The officials did not, however, order any particular decision and left the airlines a free hand.
Other airlines, including Air Canada and Qantas, previously started to refer to Taipei as located in "Taiwan, China".
The government of the Republic of China expressed discontent with the development, calling it "an affront to rules-based order".
According to the ch-aviation capacity module, the only American carrier to fly directly to Taiwan is United which offers seven flights per week between Taipei Taoyuan and San Francisco. Air Canada also operates to Taipei out of Vancouver International.
Both the government of the PRC in Beijing and the government of the de facto independent Republic of China in Taipei claim sovereignty over each other's territory under the policy known as "One China".
