'Inevitable' China and Taiwan will unite - Xi Jinping

China's President Xi Jinping has met Taiwan's opposition party leader Cheng Li-wun in Beijing, telling the visiting delegation he had "full confidence" that Taiwanese and Chinese people would be united.

Kuomintang (KMT) chairwoman Cheng is the party's first leader to visit China in a decade, but her trip has sparked debate in Taiwan with critics accusing her of being too pro-Beijing.

China severed high-level contact with Taiwan in 2016 after Tsai Ing-wen of the Democratic Progressive Party won the presidency and rejected Beijing's claims that the self-ruled island is part of its territory.

Ms Xi told Ms Cheng as the two met that "the general trend of compatriots on both sides of the Strait getting closer, edging nearer and becoming united will not change".

"This is an inevitable part of history. We have full confidence in this," Mr Xi said during the talks carried by Taiwanese media.