Most Australians back helping Taiwan if China launches attack, survey finds

Most Australians believe the international community should help Taiwan if the self-governing island was invaded by China, a new survey revealed.

The YouGov-Cambridge Globalism Project found that 62 per cent of Australians thought other countries should provide help to Taiwan if China were to invade it, The Guardian reports.

Survey participants in the US (52 per cent), Britain (51 per cent), Sweden (55 per cent) and Denmark (51 per cent) were among other nations that thought the same.

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Public opinion in other western nations supported Taiwan - which China has long claimed as a breakaway territory - the survey showed.

The majority of people surveyed would not back a US-led alliance that would equip Taiwan with troops or heavy weapons.

But at least 40 per cent of participants from 10 of the 13 Western countries in the polling supported slapping major sanctions on China, as well as supplying Taiwan with military advisers or intelligence.

The research carried out in early September surveyed 1005 Australians.

They were among more than 25,000 adults from 25 countries who took part in the polling this year.

China claims Taiwan as its own territory, to be annexed by force if necessary. The sides split after a civil war in 1949 and have no official relations.

The findings from the YouGov-Cambridge Globalism Project report were released amid the announcement China President Xi Jinping will serve a third term at the ruling Communist Party's congress earlier this month.

At the opening of the congress on October 16, Xi told the nearly 2300 handpicked delegates inside Beijing's Great Hall of the People that he vowed to "reunify" the mainland with Taiwan.

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China would "strive for peaceful reunification," Xi said, before giving a grim warning that Beijing would "never promise to renounce the use of force."

Under Xi, Beijing has ramped up military pressure on Taiwan, sending warplanes and conducting military drills near the island.

Following China's tacit support for Russia's invasion of Ukraine, concerns have only grown over Beijing's plans for Taiwan.

- Reported with CNN