"If the Taiwan authorities refuse, sine die, the peaceful settlement of cross-Straits reunification through negotiations, then the Chinese government will be forced to adopt all drastic measures possible, including the use of force," said the official Xinhua news agency.

The warning came in an 11,000-word White Paper on Taiwan issued ahead of the March 18 presidential elections on the island and ahead of next week's annual sitting of China's parliament, the National People's Congress.

China has in the past only threatened to use force against Taiwan in the case of a foreign invasion, a proclamation of independence or "internal chaos", analysts said.

"The only future for Taiwan is reunification with the China mainland ... Any attempt to separate Taiwan from China through so-called referendum would only lead the Taiwan people to disaster," the White Paper warned.

The paper also launched a vitriolic attack on Taiwanese President Lee Teng-hui, calling him a "saboteur" and a "troublemaker" who was pushing the island towards independence.

"Under the direction of Lee Teng-hui, the Taiwan authorities have adopted a series of measures toward actual separation," said the text.

The document attacked Lee's call on July 9 last year for cross-strait relations be put on a "state-to-state" level, insisting all countries must stick to the 'One China' principle which accepts Taiwan is a province of China.

"Facts prove that a serious crisis still exists in the situation in the Taiwan Straits," added the text.

Lee is not standing for re-election in the March 18 polls, but Beijing has kept up a steady stream of invective against the veteran KMT leader who won Taiwan's first ever elections in 1996.

Taiwan's Vice President Lien Chan, the ruling Kuomintang (KMT) candidate, has backed Lee's "state-to-state" comments but has also struck a conciliatory pose in recent weeks by calling for direct trade, postal and transportation exchanges.

After bellicose rhetoric from Beijing, pro-independence candidate Chen Shui-bian has also tried to calm the waters by insisting he had no plans to declare independence.

The White Paper reiterated the eight-point plan for reunification outlined by President Jiang Zemin five years ago which offered a "looser" version of the "One Country, Two Systems" formula under which Hong Kong and Macau returned to the mainland in 1997 and 1999 respectively.

It said the KMT's long-held view Taiwan could only reunify with a democratic mainland was an "excuse for delaying and resisting reunification."

The paper also raised the thorny issue of US arms sales to Taiwan, the subject of Sino-US security talks in Beijing last week involving US Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott.

"No country maintaining diplomatic relations with China should provide arms to Taiwan or enter into military alliance in any form with Taiwan. The US has repeatedly contravened its solemn undertakings to China."

Ahead of the 1996 Taiwan elections China carried out large-scale wargames during which it fired missiles off the Taiwanese coast in a bid to intimidate voters.

The exercises plunged cross-strait ties to a dangerous low and led the United States to move two battle carrier groups to waters off Taiwan.

During last week's talks in Beijing the US side expressed concern over the build-up of Chinese missiles across from Taiwan.

Over the weekend Taiwan said it stepped up security to counter any potential threat from the Chinese mainland over the election period, while Hong Kong press reports said Jiang was touring military installations in southern China.

Taiwan and the mainland were split in 1949 at the end of the civil war when the nationalist forces fled to the island and the communists took power on the mainland.

Copyright 1999 AFP. All rights reserved. The material on this page is provided by AFP and may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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