China hit back yesterday at Taiwan's refusal to admit the Olympic torch, saying the island's Olympic committee had reneged on an earlier agreement to let the relay pass through.

Beijing, host of the 2008 summer games, unveiled the torch relay schedule on Thursday and included self-governed Taiwan, which China claims as its own, as the stop before Hong Kong.

But Taiwan sporting officials said that part of the 137,000-km route around the world ignored the democratic island's demand that the torch not enter or exit via mainland China, Hong Kong or Macau.

Jiang Xiaoyu, executive vice-president of the Beijing Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG), told a hastily arranged news conference that China was "surprised by (Taiwan's) attitude and comments".

"BOCOG believes the current attitude of the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee and its authorities breached the principle of separating sport from politics as enshrined in the Olympic charter," Jiang said.

Taiwan is referred to as "Chinese Taipei" in Olympic affairs, a compromise that was reached in the late 1970s to allow the return of China to the sporting movement.

"We hope they will respect the agreement and will respect the planned route which has been approved by the IOC," Jiang added.

China has claimed sovereignty over Taiwan since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949. Beijing has vowed to bring the island of 23 million people back under mainland rule, by force if necessary.

As a measure of China's sensitivity over Taiwan and Olympics-related criticism, its tightly controlled state media made no mention of Taipei's rejection of the torch.

China's censors also cut the signal briefly and blacked out the screen on BBC and CNN reports about the controversy, even though very few Chinese have access to foreign television.

In Taiwan, some media criticised the pro-independence government of President Chen Shui-bian's rejection of the plan, saying politics should not be allowed to intrude into sport.