China 'firmly opposes' US sale of arms to Taiwan

China's foreign ministry said on Tuesday that Beijing "firmly opposes" the sale of arms by the United States to Taiwan.

Foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told the regular press conference the arms sales violated the one-China principle that the US had promised to stick to when establishing diplomatic ties with China.

His comments came after reports saying that the White House was moving ahead with three sales of advanced weaponry to Taiwan and has sent notification of the deals to Congress for approval.

In response to protests from Tokyo to the entry of Chinese coast guard ships into the disputed waters off the East China Sea, Zhao said the disputed Diaoyu Islands - or Senkaku Islands as Japan calls them - are Chinese territory.

"It is China's inherent right to carry out cruise law enforcement in the Diaoyu Islands waters, which Japan should earnestly respect," Zhao said.

Japan said two Chinese coast guard ships entered the Japanese-claimed waters on Sunday morning and had remained there, ignoring repeated warnings and exit demands by the Japanese side.

Japan has protested to the Chinese side and demanded that the Chinese ships immediately move out of Japanese waters.

At the same press conference, Zhao Lijian also repeated China's position on the border issues with India, in response to the report that India opened new bridges along its disputed border with China in the Ladakh province and Arunachal Pradesh.

Zhao said China was against the construction of any infrastructure aimed at contesting the military control in the disputed areas.

"Neither sides should take any action that may complicate the situation in the border areas, so as not to damage the efforts of both sides on easing the tension," he said.

India and China have held several rounds of talks by military, diplomatic and political officials, including negotiations between their foreign ministers and defense ministers in Moscow aimed at ending a monthslong standoff along their disputed border in the remote Ladakh region.

The fiercely contested de facto border, known as Line of Actual Control, separates Chinese-held and Indian-held territories from Ladakh in the west to India’s eastern state of Arunachal Pradesh, which China claims in its entirety.

It is broken in parts where the Himalayan nations of Nepal and Bhutan border China.

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