China's defence ministry said Saturday it would suspend military exchanges with the United States and impose sanctions on companies selling weaponry to Taiwan over Washington's planned $6.4-billion US arms deal with the island.

China took a similar step in 2008 after the former Bush administration announced a multibillion-dollar arms sale to Taiwan — the most sensitive issue in U.S.-China relations.

Beijing claims the self-governing Taiwan as its own territory, while the United States is Taiwan's most important ally and largest arms supplier.

The United States does not recognize Taiwan as a sovereign nation, but the U.S. government says it's bound by the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act to ensure the island is capable of responding to Chinese threats. China has more than 1,000 ballistic missiles aimed at Taiwan.

Taiwan to buy helicopters, defence missiles

Under the current arms deal, the United States would sell Taiwan 60 Black Hawk helicopters, worth $3.1 billion, along with communications technology for fighter jets, a pair of Osprey mine-sweeping ships, 114 Patriot air defence missiles, machine guns and ammunition.

The Chinese defence ministry summoned the U.S. Embassy’s defence attaché on Saturday to notify Washington military ties had been suspended, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

The trigger for China's flurry of angry responses came as the deal was sent to Congress for approval on Friday, signalling that the sale would likely go ahead.

"The United States must be responsible for the serious repercussions if it does not immediately reverse the mistaken decision to sell Taiwan weapons," Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister He Yafei told the U.S. ambassador to China, Jon Huntsman.

The foreign minister also called the deal a "rude interference in China's internal affairs, severely endangering China's national security."

Defence ministry spokesman Huang Xueping said the U.S. plan would "seriously disturb relations between the two countries."

With files from The Associated Press