China's National People's Congress earlier adopted an "anti-secession" law which gives its military the legal basis to attack Taiwan if the island moves towards independence.

Washington described the move as "unfortunate," while the French foreign ministry said that EU countries were consulting on how to react.

"The Americans will take this opportunity to recall their opposition to a lifting of the EU arms embargo on China," said Adam Ward of the International Institute of Strategic Studies in London.

In December the 25 EU heads of government restated their intention to lift the ban, which was put in place after the crackdown on the Tiananmen square democracy movement in 1989.

Last month President George W. Bush used his European tour to put on record his opposition to a lifting of the embargo -- a position shared by the US Congress.

"China's move will give arguments to the United States which can now say - look, there is another reason not to lift the embargo. There is a new proof that China is a threat to Taiwan," said Jean-Vincent Brisset of the Paris-based Institute for International and Strategic Relations.

"The US thinks lifting the embargo would be a blunder on many levels -- because of the human rights situation which still exists in China and in terms of the political signals it would send to Beijing on Taiwan," said Ward.

"There is a unique degree of unanimity in the US on this. They believe the risk of a conflict in the Taiwan Straits is not negligible," he added.

The Europeans see an end to the embargo as a chance to penetrate new parts of the Chinese market and to boost their sales of non-military goods, according to Brisset.

"The Europeans have their eye on the great Chinese market. As for the Chinese, they say: as long as you do not sell us arms, we will not buy your Airbus.

"But the Europeans do not realise what they are doing. Because the Chinese buy very little. They buy samples and manufacture their own counterfeits," he said.

For Yiyi Lu of the British research centre Chatham House, "The Americans will of course bring the Chinese vote up at their discussions with the Europeans. They will say it is a new threat."

But the vote "will change little" because it was not a surprise, she said. Brisset agreed. "This is nothing really new," he said, pointing out that the Chinese Communist party has always reserved the right to intervene against Taiwan and that similar threats were made in 1995 and 1996.

With 23 million inhabitants, Taiwan has enjoyed de facto independence since the end of the civil war between Communist and Nationalist Chinese in 1949.

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