Beijing - China's ruling Communist Party sees the signing of four economic agreements with Taiwan on Tuesday as a small step on the path that it hopes will lead to eventual unification with the island state, a leading scholar said.

"In this situation the main aims are to promote economic, trade and cultural exchanges across the Strait, and to realize and normalize the 'three direct links' of trade, mail, and air and shipping services across the Taiwan Strait," Li Jiaquan told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

"This trip does not cover political issues," Li said of the three-day visit to Taiwan by Chen Yunlin, the head of China's Association of Relations across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS).

"The issue of unification is not on the agenda yet," said Li, who is the former head of the Taiwan Research Institute under a state-run social science academy.

"This question can only be addressed in a long-term process of peace, development and cooperation," he said.

At a ceremony to see off Chen Yunlin from Beijing's main airport on Monday, China's top official for Taiwan affairs said the two sides should "first tackle the issues that are relatively easier to solve".

The signing of the four agreements would "lay a foundation for more comprehensive development of cross-Strait relations," said Wang Yi, who heads the Communist Party's Taiwan Work Office and its state equivalent.

Ongoing consultations with Taiwan would proceed "step by step" and be "confined to the four issues this time," the government's official Xinhua news agency quoted Wang as saying.

"Chen's current Taiwan trip follows the principle of economy ahead of politics, the easy ahead of the difficult, and progressing in a steady and orderly manner," Zhu Songling, a researcher at the Beijing Union University, said in a commentary in the official China Daily newspaper.

"That Chen's visit to Taiwan has not been affected by the tainted milk incident, or the mob attack on ARATS vice president Zhang Mingqing during his Taiwan trip last month, signifies that mutual knowledge and understanding between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait have advanced to a new level," Zhu said.

Relations have improved since former president Chen Shui-bian of the Democratic Progressive Party left office and Ma Ying-jeou of the Kuomintang (KMT or Nationalist) party took power in March.

The two sides signed agreements on expansion of charter flights and tourism during landmark talks in Beijing in June.

China had been angered by Chen Shui-bian's efforts to forge a separate identity for the diplomatically isolated island state during his eight years as president.

Trade and tourism between China and Taiwan have been severely restricted since the two sides split at the end of a civil war between Communist and Nationalist troops in 1949, but many Taiwanese firms have opened manufacturing and other businesses on the mainland in the past 25 years.

An "anti-secession law" introduced in 2005 gave China the legal basis to use "non-peaceful means" against Taiwan if the island seeks formal independence or if the possibility of "peaceful reunification" is exhausted.

Much of China's military hardware is deployed against Taiwan, which Beijing has regarded as a renegade province since 1949 when Nationalist troops fled to the island after losing a civil war to the Communists.

But China has toned down its rhetoric since President Hu Jintao took over the leadership of the party in November 2002 and the state in March 2003.

At the five-yearly Communist Party congress last October, Hu made a "solemn appeal" to Taiwan's leaders to "discuss a formal end to the state of hostility between the two sides" and reach a peace agreement.

Yet no talks on unification are likely for at least four years, the length of Ma's first term in office, if Taiwan's president sticks to his pre-election pledge.

China also expects no fundamental change in Washington's policy on Taiwan once the new US president takes office.

Beijing was angered by the US decision last month to sell arms valued at 6.4 billion dollars to Taiwan, saying US-Chinese military relations would be "poisoned" over the deal.

Since Washington switched its formal diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to the People's Republic of China in 1979, the Taiwan Relations Act has required the United States to help Taiwan to defend itself, though Washington would not necessarily intervene if China attacked the island.

While the United States still favours keeping the status quo on cross-Strait relations, it has shifted its position with the change of leadership in Taiwan, Li said.

"The US stance on the Taiwan issue is no unification, no independence, no occupation," he said.

"Now that Chen has stepped down, the US's attention has moved from preventing independence to preventing reunification," Li said. (dpa)