Taipei  - A Taiwan company said Thursday it will launch a regular cruise service with China next week, making it the first such cross-strait service in six decades.

Following Taiwan's dropping a ban on sea links with China, the Excalibur International Marine Corp said it would launch the Taichung-Xiamen cruise starting Monday in conjunction with three travel agencies.

The trip from Taichung, west Taiwan, to Xianmen, on China's southeastern coast, is five hours.

Excalibur bought the 2,292-ton Ocean Lala cruise ship from Spain to operate the weekly cruise, serving mainly Taiwan businessmen and tourists.

Currently, Taiwan and China allow only Taiwanese and Chinese companies to offer cross-strait cruise. But one foreign shipping line, the Hong Kong-based Star Cruises, which is the leading cruise line in Asia-Pacific, has applied to launch services.

Taiwan and China have been split since the end of the Chinese Civil War in 1949, but tension began to thaw in the late 1980s.

Cross-strait exchanges picked up momentum after Ma Ying-jeou from the China-friendly Chinese Nationalist Party became president in May 2008.

Last November, Taipei and Beijing agreed to launch sea links and daily charter flights which will be expanded to regular flights in August. (dpa)