The Eastern TV cable news network showed live footage of about 20 howitzers shooting on mock targets during the artillery exercise on Kinmen, an island just miles from China's southeastern Xiamen city.

The broadcast showed a Chinese ship staying near Kinmen until the end of the drill.

Taiwan army officials would not comment on the report which accused the Chinese vessel of "spying" on the artillery exercise.

Military authorities said the exercise was "routine", adding it was neither a show of strength nor part of a string of wargames to due to end on August 25.

Kinmen has been controlled by Taiwan since it split with the mainland in 1949 at the end of a civil war. In 1958, hundreds of thousands of artillery shells hit the island during a People's Liberation Army bombardment.

Also on Wednesday, Taiwan's army showed off its fleet of M60-A3 tanks to reporters on a publicity tour of an army base at Houli, central Taiwan.

"We have faith to crush the enemy invading the country," an unnamed army officer told reporters.

During the past few weeks Taiwan's armed forces have conducted a series of maneuvers aimed at deterring a Chinese invasion.

China, which has some 600 ballistic missiles aimed at the island, has also been staging large-scale military exercises on Dongshan island, 150 nautical miles west of Taiwan, as part of its stepped-up preparedness for conflict.

Despite closer economic links across the Taiwan Straits, hostility between Taipei and Beijing has increased since the pro-independence President Chen Shui-bian took office in 2000.

Beijing further ratcheted up its rhetoric against Chen following his reelection in March, with Beijing stressing its long-standing vow to take Taiwan by force should the island try to declare formal independence.

WAR.WIRE