Taiwan's denial of communist role in World War Two is 'blasphemy', China says

BEIJING (Reuters) -China said on Wednesday Taiwan was "blaspheming" the sacrifices of those who died fighting Japan in World War Two by denying the pivotal role of the communist party and denounced Taipei's call for Taiwanese to stay away from Beijing's commemorations.

This year's 80th anniversary of the end of the war, preceded in China by Japan's 1931 takeover of eastern Manchuria and its subsequent invasion of the rest of the country in 1937, has set off a bitter battle of narratives between Beijing and Taipei.

Taiwan says China's ruling communist party is falsely claiming credit for leading the fighting when most of it was done by Republic of China forces, whose government then fled to the island in 1949, after losing a civil war.

Democratically-governed Taiwan retains the Republic of China as its formal name.

Taiwan was "slandering and obliterating" the communist party's role as the country's "backbone" in fighting Japan, Zhu Fenglian, a spokesperson for China's Taiwan Affairs Office, said in Beijing, the capital.

"This is a grave blasphemy against all the loyal martyrs and heroes and a shameless betrayal of the entire Chinese nation," Zhu told a press briefing.

Taiwan has urged people not to attend Beijing's large-scale military parade next week for the anniversary and threatened punishment, such as pension suspension, for current or former senior defence, intelligence or diplomatic officials, who do.

Zhu said the war anniversary should be commemorated by people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait and representatives from Taiwan had been invited to China's events, but gave no details.

"Our compatriots in Taiwan should not, and cannot, be absent from the relevant commemorative activities."

Threats, intimidation, interference or obstruction of Taiwanese taking part by the ruling Democratic Progressive Party were "despicable acts that betray history and the nation", she added.

China is also marking the anniversary of the handover of Taiwan, a Japanese colony from 1895 to 1945, to the Chinese government at the war's end.

Taiwan calls that another distorted claim, saying sovereignty was ceded to the Republic of China, not the People's Republic of China, which only came into existence in 1949 with Mao Zedong's revolution.

China views Taiwan as its own territory, a sovereignty claim rejected by the island's government, which says only its people can decide their future.

(Reporting by Liz Lee; Additional reporting and writing by Ben Blanchard in Taipei; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)