Taiwan on Monday formally stripped the word "China" from the names of two of its most high-profile state-run companies, a move intended to emphasise the island's separate identity from its mainland rival.
"Changing these names is a small part of our effort to make Taiwan a full, normal country," Chen Shui-bian, Taiwan president, said at a ceremony to mark the rebranding of the island's postal system as "Taiwan Post".
Beijing, which claims sovereignty over Taiwan and has threatened war if it formalises its current de facto independence, did not immediately respond to the renaming of the postal system and of China Petroleum Corp, which is now named in English "CPC Corp, Taiwan".
However, Beijing has repeatedly denounced Mr Chen and Taiwan's independence-minded ruling Democratic Progressive party for pursuing what it calls "creeping independence" and "de-Sinification".
The decision to strip references to China from the names the national post and oil companies as well as other state owned companies has also drawn opposition from the US, Taiwan's strongest international supporter and the final arbiter of the island's security.
"We do not support administrative steps by Taiwan authorities that would appear to change Taiwan's status unilaterally or move toward independence," US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told a regular press conference on Friday.
A precipitous decline in the political influence commanded by Mr Chen has helped to cool tensions with China over the past two years by killing his dreams of rewriting the democratic island's constitution.
However, the renaming of the postal system and the island's biggest oil company - which did not require approval by the legislature - will fuel Beijing's concerns about how Mr Chen might use his administrative authority before his term ends in 2008.
Taiwanese officials have defended the renaming effort by saying it will prevent Taiwanese companies continuing to be confused with those from the Chinese mainland. Opposition party leaders criticised the move, saying it would increase tensions with China and waste taxpayer funds.
Many Taiwanese have long resented the widespread use for state companies of names that either directly refer to or evoke China, a practice imposed by the authoritarian Kuomintang government that fled to the island following defeat in the Chinese civil war in 1949.
However, the renaming has been opposed by Taiwanese who share the KMT's goal of eventual reunification with the mainland.
Mr Chen's ceremony at a Taipei post office was accompanied by chanting and placard-waving protesters, mainly members of the postal service's labour union and a scattering of pro-unification activists and KMT politicians.
Chinese state media last month denounced as "exceedingly dangerous" a planned revision of the charter of Taipei's world-famous Palace Museum that will remove a statement at its top that the artefacts it owns come from Beijing's Forbidden City.
