China says Vatican concert can help understanding

BEIJING (Reuters) - A concert played by China's national orchestra for Pope Benedict can help build friendship and understanding, Beijing said on Thursday, as it seeks to improve relations with the Holy See.

The China Philharmonic Orchestra played Mozart and Chinese folk songs before a packed concert hall in the Vatican on Wednesday.

"We think this performance will help to enhance the mutual understanding and friendship between our two peoples," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang told a news conference.

"China is willing to strengthen relations with the Vatican and will make unremitting efforts in this regard," he said, calling music a "bridge of communication".

China has not had diplomatic relations with the Vatican since two years after its Communist, atheist government took power in 1949. Its Catholics are split between those who belong to a state-backed church and those who worship in unofficial congregations whose members are loyal to the Vatican.

But some diplomats have likened Wednesday's concert to a musical version of the "ping-pong diplomacy" of the 1970s, the exchange of table tennis teams that foreshadowed the normalisation of relations between China and the United States.

Pope Benedict has made improving relations with China a major goal of his pontificate, issuing an open letter last year saying he sought to restore full diplomatic ties with Beijing.

But the main sticking points are the Vatican's relations with Taiwan, which Beijing considers a renegade province, and China's appointment of bishops without papal approval.

(Reporting by Lindsay Beck and Beijing Newsroom)