In another life, yours truly worked as Asian Director for a medium sized UK firm - (well they called my region the "Far East" - an appropriate term given their attitudes as we shall see)

On one of my trips to the center of a considerably smaller British Empire, I found that a bright spark in the database department was routinely changing all addresses with a "Republic of China" address to "China". After explaining that the Republic of China was Taiwan and that the People's Republic of China was China, they nodded their heads..

They changed the database, but when that "expert" left another took her place, who started again changing addresses. We changed it back, and two months later Taiwnese customers were on the blower fuming to me about where their deliveries were.

Sure enough, those who knew better in that small island had changed Taiwan to China again.

The Taipei Times reported it earlier this week thus -

The word "Taiwan" in Roman script is to be added to the cover rather than inside the new version of Taiwanese passports, alongside the country's formal designation "Republic of China," President Chen Shui-bian announced yesterday.

It was a smart move for Taiwan to change the wording on the front of their passports to include the Romanised word for better international recognition. Most people, even in International Business don't know the difference.

China's reaction was predictably beligerant, reflecting the "strong leader" ethos that has peppered Chinese history and it's foreign relations.

See: BBC News - China warns Taiwan on independence

Excerpt:
The Chinese Government has warned Taiwan of what it described as "unpleasant consequences" if it moves towards independence.
The official news agency Xinhua quoted a spokesman for Beijing's Taiwan Affairs Office as saying that the government in Taipei was moving gradually towards independence despite a promise not to.

He said Taipei's decision to put the word Taiwan on the island's passports and unspecified separatist polices in the cultural, historical, educational and communication fields were evidence to that.

Of course, any action from Taiwan that could be even slightly construed as defending their independence in jumped on by China.

To the rest of the world, it's a bloody good idea..