US President Donald Trump has agreed to honour the so-called "One China" policy in a phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping, the White House said.
The One China policy is the diplomatic acknowledgement that there is only one Chinese government.
Mr Trump had placed the long-standing policy in doubt when he spoke with Taiwan's president in December.
China sees Taiwan as a breakaway province to be reunified with the mainland.
The move was a major break from traditional protocol and provoked an official complaint from China.
The telephone conversation was the first between the two since Mr Trump took office on 20 January, though the new US president has called several other national leaders.
The content of the phone call between Mr Trump and Mr Xi will be celebrated in Beijing as signalling a return to the traditional framework of the US-China relationship.
Three weeks into the new American administration, after a score of phone calls between Mr Trump and other world leaders, China's absence from the list was becoming ever more conspicuous.
Two months ago it looked as though Mr Trump might be willing to reshape the relationship between the world's two biggest economies. Not only did he warn that he would consider 45% tariffs against China and brand Beijing a currency manipulator; from Beijing's point of view, far more shocking was his willingness to take a phone call from the president of Taiwan and his suggestion that the status of Taiwan might become a bargaining chip in negotiation for some other American objective.
But many Chinese citizens see Taiwan as the last piece in China's territorial jigsaw. Any further move towards independence and international recognition for the island would have represented a dangerous humiliation for Mr Xi.
With the presidential phone call, Beijing can draw a line under such fears. Three weeks in, it has won a clear and unequivocal commitment from the Trump administration to honour the One China policy. And after all the threats and promises Mr Trump made about China on the campaign trail, it is not clear what, if anything, the Trump administration has won in return.
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