China has warned Pacific nations against caving in to Taiwan’s “dollar diplomacy”, cautioning it would be against their interests to establish ties with Taipei over Beijing, state media reported.

Vice Foreign Minister Zhou Wenzhong said it was important that Pacific nations that wanted to develop relations with Beijing recognise the “one-China” principle which states that Taiwan is part of China.

Zhou, who met Pacific leaders after their annual summit in Samoa last week, said Pacific island nations should be “highly vigilant to the political manoeuvres of the Taiwan authorities to split up China and undermine China’s relations” with them and other countries with diplomatic ties with Beijing.

Only 27 countries maintain ties with Taiwan instead of China and several of them are in the Pacific, including the Marshall Islands, Palau, Tuvalu and the Solomon Islands.

Late last year, Kiribati switched allegiances from China to Taiwan.

Zhou accused Taiwan of “vigorously carrying out a ‘dollar diplomacy’“ by trying to buy their way into official relations with Pacific countries which have economic difficulties.

Taipei has previously accused Beijing of doing the same.

“What the Taiwan authorities have done has provoked internal turbulence in certain countries and jeopardised regional stability to the detriment of the fundamental and long-term interests of countries and peoples in the South Pacific region,” said Zhou.

The Pacific Island’s Forum this year rejected a bid to allow Taiwan to be a dialogue partner, as China has been since 1990.

“I think we’ve made good progress in our relations with the forum and the countries in the region,” Zhou was quoted as saying by the China Daily.

“China will continue to do its utmost to provide aid to all island countries that have diplomatic relations with China,” he said.

The forum groups Australia, the Cook Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, Nauru, New Zealand, Niue, Palau, Papau New Guinea, Samoa, the Solomons, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.

Many of the forum members have scarce natural resources and rely on aid and tourism for survival.

Zhou said China had agreed to grant “approved destination status” to Fiji, Vanuatu, Tonga and the Cook Islands for Chinese tourists. All Pacific nations recognising China would benefit from this, he said.

“In principle we’ll do that in phases, so there’ll be more announcements on the way,” Zhou said.

China and Taiwan split at the end of a civil war in 1949, but Beijing considers the island part of its territory, to be returned by force if necessary.