Relations across the Taiwan Straits will face severe challenges this year, as the Taiwan authorities' efforts to seek "de jure independence" through the so- called "constitutional reform" might enter into a "substantive" stage, a spokesman of China's top legislature's said here on Sunday.

A series of "de-sinicizing" moves recently adopted by the Taiwan authorities in an apparent push for secession showed strains on mainland-Taiwan relations were lurking around, said Jiang Enzhu, spokesman for the Fifth Session of the Tenth National People's Congress (NPC), at a press conference.

Two elections in Taiwan, namely the election of the " Legislative Yuan" at the end of this year and the Taiwan leader election in 2008, are expected to bring changes to the political environment on the island.

"No difficulties may challenge our faith in maintaining the peaceful development of the cross-Straits relations, nor can any new troubles sway our determination to check 'Taiwan independence', " Jiang said.

Cross-Straits relations kept a peaceful and steady momentum last year, Jiang said. The indirect trade volume between the mainland and Taiwan hit a record 107.8 billion U.S. dollars last year.

Taiwan residents made more than 4.4 million visits to the mainland and the figures for mainland visits to Taiwan was more than 200,000 in 2006.

Meanwhile, the door for dialogues between political parties cross the Straits remains open. The inter-Party exchanges and dialogues between the Communist Party of China and the Taiwan- based Kuomintang, People First Party and New Party had won applause across the Straits.

Source: Xinhua