Taipei - Taiwan and China agreed Monday to hold a second round of high-level talks in Taipei next week, despite threats by pro-independence activists to disrupt the meeting.

"The Chinese mainland's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) chairman Chen Yunlin will lead a delegation to Taiwan from December 3 to 7, the first meeting on the island between the two parties," the official Chinese news agency Xinhua reported.

Kao Koong-lian, vice chairman of Taiwan's Straits Exchange Foundation, who led the 11-member delegation for a one-day preparatory round of talks held in the Chinese border city of Shenzhen, told Taiwanese media Chen was to lead a 60-member delegation in next week's talks in Taipei.

Chen's visit comes after a mob manhandled his deputy, Zhang Mingqing, who visited Taiwan last week.

A lawmaker from the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) allegedly incited a mob to carry out the attack, in which Zhang was shoved to the ground.

Taiwan's top security officials vowed Monday to uphold absolute safety of Chen and his delegation during their stay in Taiwan.

"Security measures to be adopted will be so tight not even a drop of water could come through," said National Security Bureau director Tsai Chao-ming, while police said a 7,000-strong police will be deployed force to ensure the safety of Chen and other delegates.

DPP spokesman Cheng Wen-tsan, however, said the party and its supporters would not let Chen leave Taiwan so easily. "We will follow him everywhere to voice our protest against China and to show our dissatisfaction over the policy of Ma Ying-jeou's government to lean towards China," he said.

Since President Ma Ying-jeou of the China-friendly Nationalist Party took office in May, the DPP has been upset over his policy to engage China, viewing it as his attempt to make Taiwan return to the Chinese fold.

Chen will be the highest-ranking Chinese official to visit Taiwan since 1949, when Taiwan and China split at the end of the Chinese Civil War.

Chen and his Taiwan counterpart Chiang Ping-kun are expected to discuss and sign pacts on direct shipping, postal services, expansion of weekend charter flights and the safety of China's food exports to Taiwan. (dpa)