China warns Taiwan of 'disaster' scenario

China’s government said today that the Taiwanese president’s move to scrap an agency dedicated to Taiwan’s unification with the Chinese mainland will bring disaster for the island.

Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian “is determined to push ’Taiwan independence’ to create antagonism and conflict within Taiwan and across the strait”, the Communist Party and the government said in a joint statement carried by the official Xinhua News Agency.

“It will only bring disaster to Taiwan society,” the statement said.

Chen announced yesterday that he was terminating the National Unification Council and doing away with its guidelines, which commit Taiwan to eventual unification with the mainland.

Taiwan and China split amid civil war in 1949, but Beijing considers the democratic, self-governing island 160 kilometres (100 miles) off its coast to be Chinese territory, and has repeatedly threatened to attack if Taiwan tries to make its de facto independence official.