Here's the full article, in case you haven't registered for the NY Times. Powell said it,"Taiwan bu shi yi ge du li guo jia" - "Taiwan is not an independent country." And I think Mr. Powell didn't go against the State Department and its policies. This has been the policy all along. Warnings by Powell to Taiwan Provoke a Diplomatic Dispute By JOSEPH KAHN Published: October 28, 2004 EIJING, Oct. 27 - Chinese officials praised Secretary of State Colin L. Powell on Wednesday for warning Taiwan that it is not an independent nation and should not seek to become one. But Taiwanese leaders sharply criticized Mr. Powell for changing a longstanding policy in managing the diplomatically nuanced rivalry. The reactions came after Mr. Powell, speaking in two television interviews on Monday during a brief visit to Beijing, emphasized that Taiwan was not a sovereign nation and that the United States favored its "peaceful reunification" with China. The comments - which Mr. Powell carefully avoided repeating Wednesday in Washington - went beyond the ambiguous language American officials had used for several decades in managing relations between China and Taiwan. The United States has recognized China's claim that there is only "one China," including Taiwan, but has not explicitly backed reunification and has emphasized that any change in the status quo must come only when people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait agree to terms. While State Department officials insisted that the secretary's comments did not reflect a change in United States policy, both China and Taiwan, sensitive to every accent and inflection in the American approach, reacted strongly. A Chinese Foreign Ministry official, speaking in a telephone interview, called the comments "helpful and constructive." Separately, Zhang Mingqing, a spokesman for Beijing's Taiwan Affairs Office, said at a news briefing on Wednesday that the comments addressed a Chinese complaint about American policy. "Some people have said Powell made a slip of the tongue, but I don't think so," Mr. Zhang said. Taiwan, a democratic enclave that has long relied on American military and political support, reacted with surprise and anger. Foreign Minister Chen Tan-sun called Mr. Powell's comments the "toughest statement" the United States had made since it switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979. Speaking on Tuesday, Chen Shui-bian, Taiwan's president, lashed out at Mr. Powell. "Taiwan is absolutely a sovereign and independent country," Mr. Chen told the local news media. "It does not belong to the People's Republic of China." The spat came as a surprise. American officials had recently praised Mr. Chen for offering to resume talks with China. Mr. Powell had been expected to press China to offer some reciprocal gesture to reduce tensions. Instead, Mr. Powell seemed determined either to send a fresh warning to Taiwan or to strengthen relations with the mainland, or both. Speaking in an interview with Phoenix Television of Hong Kong, Mr. Powell expanded on America's "one China'' policy when he said: "There is only one China. Taiwan is not independent. It does not enjoy sovereignty as a nation." Taiwan is formally called the Republic of China, a name left over from the time when the Nationalist Party governed all of China. The United States had not in the past explicitly rebutted Taiwan's claim of sovereignty as the Republic of China. In a separate interview, with CNN, Mr. Powell also changed the diplomatic code used to discuss the outcome of any talks between the rival governments. "We want both sides not to take unilateral action that would prejudice an eventual outcome, a reunification that all parties are seeking," he said. In the past, American officials had not endorsed China's contention that the goal should be reunification, which China insists it will achieve "at any price," including war.