Attack on Taiwan still an option: China general

China will attack Taiwan if there is no other way of stopping it from becoming independent, one of the country's most senior generals has said.

Joe Davies reports.

One of China's most senior generals says that an attack on Taiwan is still an option to stop Taiwanese independence.

That was the warning from Li Zuocheng, on Friday (May 29).

However, Li Zhanshu, the third-most-senior leader of China’s ruling Communist Party, told the same event that non-peaceful means were an option of last resort.

A 2005 law gives China the legal right to take military action against Taiwan, which it considers a Chinese province.

And China has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control.

But such an explicit statement from the military is incredibly rare.

Taiwan's government denounced the comments.

It said threats of war were a violation of international law, and that Taiwan has never been a part of the People's Republic of China.

Taiwan is China's most sensitive territorial issue.

Beijing is deeply suspicious of Taiwan president Tsai Ing-wen, who it accuses of being a separatist.

The mood in Taiwan towards China has soured further since China's parliament passed new national security legislation for Chinese-ruled Hong Kong on Thursday (May 28).