More than 200 people were injured, over 80 of them seriously, in an explosion at a water park outside Taiwan's capital Taipei Saturday after colored powder being sprayed onto a crowd ignited, officials said.

"Our initial understanding is this explosion and fire... was caused by the powder spray. It could have been due to the heat of the lights on the stage," said a spokesman for the New Taipei City fire department, adding that 205 had been hospitalized including 81 who are seriously injured.

Leaders of China's Communist Party will meet the chairman of Taiwan's ruling Kuomintang (KMT) party early next month, state media said Friday, amid improving relations between the political foes.

Mainland officials, who were not named, will meet Eric Chu, the official Xinhua news agency reported, citing Ma Xiaoguang, of the Taiwan Work Office of the Communist Party Central Committee.

Thousands of people took to the streets in Taiwan on Saturday to call for the island to scrap its use of nuclear energy and to voice opposition to controversial plans to ship nuclear waste abroad, organizers said.

Protesters in central Taipei waved placards and dressed in T-shirts emblazoned with slogans including "Goodbye to nuclear energy" and "We don't need nuclear power", just days after Japan marked the fourth anniversary of an undersea earthquake which triggered a massive tsunami and nuclear disaster.

A former college student was sentenced to death in Taiwan Friday for killing four people and wounding more than 20 others in a subway stabbing spree that shocked the island last year.

Cheng Chieh, 22, will face a firing squad after he was convicted on four counts of murder and 22 counts of attempted murder for the May 21 attack in the capital Taipei, the first fatal attack on the city's subway system since it began operating in 1996.

Taiwan police arrested a man who crashed a sports utility vehicle into a security barrier outside the presidential office Monday, in the third similar incident in just over a year.

The previous two crashes -- in January and November 2014 -- were a form of protest by the vehicle drivers.

Taiwan's TransAsia Airways announced Wednesday that it would pay nearly half a million dollars in compensation to relatives of each of the victims of a dramatic plane crash earlier this month.

The offer of Tw$14.9 million ($470,000) for each family comes seven months after the airline made a similar payout to the families of 48 passengers killed in another crash last July.

Flags across Taiwan flew at half mast Tuesday to pay homage to the 40 people killed in a TransAsia plane crash last week, as divers battled cold weather to find the last three people missing.

"In order to mourn TransAsia Airways GE-235, all government units and schools will fly flags at half mast on Tuesday," the government said.

Taiwan rescuers scoured a river for 12 people still missing from a TransAsia plane crash Thursday, as the pilot, who died in the crash, was hailed a hero for apparently battling to avoid hitting built-up areas.

Hundreds of rescuers in boats, as well as divers and soldiers mounted the search in the chilly waters, as the death toll rose to 31 with more bodies located including those of the pilot and co-pilot, authorities said.

At least 25 people were killed Wednesday when a passenger plane operated by TransAsia Airways clipped an overpass soon after take-off and plunged into a river in Taiwan, the airline's second crash in seven months.

As the rescue operation continued into the night, a crane lifted the rear and central sections of the plane from the water, with one body retrieved from inside.

The United States on Tuesday denounced a flag-raising ceremony at Taiwan's de facto embassy in Washington, saying it violated a long-standing pact on U.S.-Taiwan ties.

"We're disappointed with the action," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said when asked about the hoisting of the Taiwanese flag at the compound on New Year's Day.