SYDNEY (BLOOMBERG) – An Air New Zealand plane en route to Shanghai was forced to return to Auckland after several hours in the air on Saturday as paperwork for the flight included reference to Taiwan, Stuff news website reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

The problem related to documentation from New Zealand’s Civil Aviation Authority which was included as part of Air New Zealand’s application to allow the particular plane to land in China, the report said.

Officials in Beijing warned the airline to remove reference to any paperwork which suggested Taiwan was a state back in 2018, but the issue was not resolved, according to the report.

During a press conference in Beijing Monday (Feb 11), China’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying blamed the flight’s temporary deployment hiccup as the reason it was not authorised to land in China, citing news reports she read online.

Air New Zealand did not immediately respond to a Stuff’s request for comment.

Some airlines, including American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United Continental, Hawaiian, Qantas Airways, Air France-KLM and Deutsche Lufthansa cooperated with China’s wishes on reference to Taiwan before last year’s deadline.

China and Taiwan have been ruled separately since the nationalist Kuomintang government fled to Taiwan after the civil war defeat in the 1940s. China’s Communist Party regards the island as its territory to be taken by force if necessary.

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