Washington - China's decision to reduce contacts with the United States over weapons sales to Taiwan is "unfortunate", the US State Department said Tuesday, while pledging to continue working with Beijing.

"It's an unfortunate decision that the Chinese have taken," deputy spokesman Robert Wood said.

China strongly opposed the plans announced last week to sell 6.4 billion dollars in arms to Taiwan, and said US-Chinese military relations would be "poisoned" over the deal.

Beijing - China's foreign ministry on Tuesday said a US arms deal for Taiwan had "poisoned" military ties between Washington and Beijing, but it did not confirm US reports that China had cancelled some bilateral meetings.

"The United States ignored the opposition of China to sell military arms to Taiwan, which poisoned the Sino-US relationship and also harmed the sound atmosphere between the two militaries," ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters.

Beijing, Oct 7 : At least nine people were killed and many injured in a powerful earthquake that jolted a county near Lhasa, the capital of southwest Tibet Autonomous Region, last evening.

The death toll is expected to be much higher as at least 147 houses reportedly collapsed in Yangyi village and others in a neighboring county.

Beijing  - An earthquake measuring 6.6 on the Richter scale hit China's Tibet Autonmous Region on

Beijing  - Tourism revenue fell by nearly 40 per cent in China's Tibet region over the week-long National Day holiday because of rioting and unrest in the region earlier this year, state media said on Monday.

The number of tourist arrivals fell by 36 per cent year-on-year to 257,000 during the one-week holiday, which ended on Sunday, the government's Xinhua news agency quoted a regional tourism official as saying.

Only 110,900 tourists stayed overnight in the region, down 41.5 per cent from last year, the agency said.

Beijing  - Shares on China's main stock market lost more than 5 per cent of their value on Monday, dragged down by banking stocks, on the first day of trading after the one-week National Day holiday.

The key Shanghai Composite Index, which tracks shares traded in local and foreign currencies, fell by 120.05 points, or 5.23 per cent, to end the day at 2,173.74.

The smaller Shenzhen Component Index also lost about 4.5 per cent of its value on Monday.