China blasted US President George W. Bush on Saturday, a day before he meets Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) in France, for signing a bill supporting Taiwan's participation in the World Health Organisation (WHO).
The Foreign Ministry protested the bill Bush signed on Thursday, urged the US to stop supporting Taiwan's bid to be an observer in the WHO and warned Washington not to take actions that might hinder Sino-US relations.
"We express our resolute opposition to the American side for ignoring China's position and signing this erroneous bill," spokeswoman Zhan Qiyue said in a statement on the Foreign Ministry's Web site.
The US must "stop all statements and actions that support squeezing Taiwan into the WHO and not create barriers to the development of Sino-US relations," she said.
Taiwan, which has had the third-highest number of cases of SARS behind China and Hong Kong, has said that being shut out of the WHO was hampering its efforts to tackle the disease.
Bush and Hu are scheduled to meet on Sunday on the sidelines of a North-South dialogue in Evian, France, that is affiliated with the meeting there of the Group of Eight nations.
In a statement on the White House Web site, Bush said the bill did not change the "one China" policy of the United States and that America would continue to support Taiwan's observer status in the WHO.
"The United States fully supports the overall goal of Taiwan's participation in the work of the World Health Organisation, including observership," Bush said.
Taiwan's latest bid to join the WHO as an observer was shot down at the health body's annual assembly in Geneva earlier this month, prompting the head of Taiwan's health department to accuse the WHO of "health apartheid."
"The real goal of the Taiwan authorities' bid to squeeze into the WHO is to create an international 'two Chinas' or 'one China, one Taiwan'," the Foreign Ministry's Zhang said.
She urged the United States to "recognise the political plot of the Taiwan authorities and strictly abide by the one-China policy and the principles of the three Sino-US joint communiques."
The US Senate passed the bill on May 1 and the House of Representatives cleared it for the White House on May 14.
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