WASHINGTON, Feb. 11 -- The United States on Tuesday welcomed the first formal meeting since 1949 between chief officials in charge of cross-Strait affairs from China's mainland and Taiwan.

"We welcome the steps both sides of the Taiwan Strait have taken to reduce tensions and improve relations between Beijing and Taipei," State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki told a regular news briefing.

The meeting in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province, between Zhang Zhijun, head of the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office, and Wang Yu-chi, Taiwan's mainland affairs chief, was aimed at opening a regular communication channel between the two sides.

Relations between the mainland and Taiwan stalled when the Kuomintang, led by Chiang Kai-shek, fled to Taiwan in 1949 after being defeated in a civil war.

Business and personnel exchanges resumed in the late 1980s, and in the early 1990s the two sides started to engage with each other through the mainland-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), and its Taiwan counterpart, the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF).

Talks between ARATS and SEF, non-governmental organizations founded in 1991 and 1990 respectively, have sped up since 2008 and produced a number of important cross-Strait agreements, including an agreement to lift the ban on direct shipping, air transport and postal services in 2008 and the long-awaited Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement in 2010.

The meeting between Zhang and Wang is considered an important breakthrough in promoting cross-Strait relations and may lead to regular exchanges of official visits in the future.

"We encourage authorities in Beijing and Taipei to continue their constructive dialogue, which has led to significant improvements in the cross-Strait relationship, so we certainly welcome the resumption," Psaki said.