China's top newspaper on Monday warned against aping Western-style democracy just a week after the 25th anniversary of the Tiananmen crackdown, pointing to Thailand and Ukraine as examples of the kind of chaos the system can bring.

President Xi Jinping's ascendancy in a once-in-a-decade generational leadership transition had given many Chinese hope for political reform, mainly due to his folksy style and the legacy of his father, Xi Zhongxun, a former reformist vice premier.

But the repeated message the party has given out since Xi became president last year is that there will be no political liberalizations.