China jails Taiwanese person on separatism charge for first time

China handed a nine-year prison term to a Taiwanese political activist convicted of "separatism", a rare sentence that prompted Taiwan to warn its people about the dangers of travelling across the strait.

Yang Chih-yuan received the term in a court in the eastern Chinese city of Wenzhou, Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council said in a briefing on Sept 5, according to the semi-official Central News Agency.

China's ruling Communist Party intended for the "case to intimidate the people of Taiwan”, said council deputy minister Liang Wen-chieh, adding that travellers from the island of 23 million should be prudent when considering going across the strait.

This was the first time China jailed a Taiwanese person on a charge of trying to break up its territory, according to the council, a government department in Taipei that handles cross-strait relations.