US airlines making further websites changes to address China’s Taiwan complaints
Chinese state media accuses Delta, United and American airlines of missing a deadline to change the way they refer to the self-ruled island
The three largest US airlines have said they are in the process of amending their systems to address Beijing requests over how they refer to Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, after mainland media reported that they had yet to complete revisions in time for a Thursday deadline.
The Global Times newspaper on Thursday singled out Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, American Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines in a report which said that the companies had yet to meet requirements set by China’s aviation regulator.
Beijing has demanded that foreign firms, and airlines in particular, do not refer to self-ruled Taiwan as a non-Chinese territory on their websites, a demand the White House slammed in May as “Orwellian nonsense.”
The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC), which has been pushing airlines to make the change, had originally set a deadline of July 25.
However, it said last month that the four US airlines had asked for another extension as it perceived their amendments as “incomplete”.
It was unclear what the exact deadline was in view of the time difference between the United States and China or what additional amendments the US carriers were making.
Checks on Thursday showed Delta, United and American Airlines now list only Taipei’s airport code and city, but not the name Taiwan, while there is no mention of Taipei or Taiwan on Hawaiian Airlines’ website.