Taiwan has lashed out at China after the tiny island nation of Kiribati switched its recognition to Beijing, the second diplomatic defection in the strategically important Pacific in less than a week.
The move is another coup for Beijing just weeks before it celebrates the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.
It comes just four days after the Solomon Islands made the same decision, and leaves Taiwan more isolated than ever with just 15 states left that recognise it.
At a hastily arranged press conference on Friday, Taiwan's foreign minister Joseph Wu announced Taipei would immediately withdraw its diplomats and expected Kiribati to do the same.
He said Beijing had "seduced Kiribati to
China claims Taiwan as its territory and says the democratic island has no right to formal ties with any country.
He said Beijing had "seduced Kiribati to change its diplomatic ties" with promises of investment and aid.
"The President of Kiribati Taneti Mamau and certain people in his party have fantasies about China," Mr Wu added.
Taiwan has been a de facto sovereign nation since the end of a civil war in 1949.
Over the decades, as China's economic and military power has grown, most countries, including the United States and most Western nations, have switched recognition to Beijing.
In the last decade, only a handful have remained loyal to Taiwan, largely impoverished countries in Latin America and the Pacific. The only European state to still recognise Taiwan is the Vatican.
But Beijing stepped up its campaign to diplomatically isolate Taiwan after the 2016 election of President Tsai Ing-wen because she hails from a party that refuses to recognise the idea that the island is part of "one China".
It has also ramped up military drills and squeezed the island economically.
A tourist take photo at the Liberty Square in Taipei, Taiwan. Source: EPA
Seven states have now switched to Beijing during Tsai's tenure.
The small African nation of Sao Tome and Principe was the first to fall in late 2016, followed by Burkina Faso and then three Latin American nations: Panama, El Salvador and the Dominican Republic.
Then on Monday came the Solomons, which had been deciding for months whether to make the move following the April election of Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare.
