A Chinese official on Friday thanked the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) for its clear opposition to the Taiwan authority's separatist activities, and its long-term support for China's peaceful reunification.

Sun Yafu, vice director of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, made the remark in a seminar held in Kunming on topics of the Sino-ASEAN relationship and Taiwan issue.

The vice director said President Hu Jintao's keynote speech to the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) has expressed the latest proposition of the Chinese mainland on the Taiwan issue with great sincerity.

President Hu's speech called on negotiation by the mainland and Taiwan to end the hostile relationship between the two sides.

"Here we would like to make a solemn appeal: On the basis of the one-China principle, let us discuss a formal end to the state of hostility between the two sides, reach a peace agreement, construct a framework for peaceful development of cross-Straits relations, and thus usher in a new phase of peaceful development," Hu said in his speech.

It would play a historically important role in the process of Chinese peaceful reunification for the two sides to sign a peace agreement, Sun said.

"Taiwan has never become a country," Sun said, "It has been neither a colony nor occupied by foreign countries since 1945, leaving a clear status of being part of Chinese soil."

"So any 'referendum' inside the island to decide whether Taiwan should be independent is meaningless," he said, reiterating that the sovereignty of Taiwan belongs to all Chinese people including Taiwan compatriots.

The "referendum" attempt to split Taiwan from China would lead the island and its people to a disaster, Sun said.

The Chinese government appreciates the stance of many southeast Asian countries who have officially opposed the Taiwan authority's' referendum' attempt to push Taiwan into the United Nations, the vice director said.

Source:Xinhua