BEIJING, June 12 (Reuters) - Chinese President Hu Jintao called on the Sudanese government to take a series of steps toward peace in its Darfur region, state media said on Thursday, as it seeks to deflect criticism over its ties with Khartoum.

Hu's comments to visiting Sudanese Vice President Ali Osman Taha were unusually strong given China's close relations with Sudan, where it is a major investor in the oil industry and to whom it sells arms.

To ease the situation in Darfur, Sudan "should push forward the peacekeeping mission and political process in a balanced manner, quickly restore political negotiations and strive to ensure the talks achieve substantial progress", the Communist Party newspaper People's Daily quoted Hu as saying.

Khartoum should also "push forward the relevant parties to realise a comprehensive ceasefire and to continually improve the humanitarian and security situation and on this basis help the people of Darfur to rebuild their homeland", he said.

Hu's comments mark a change in tone from Vice President Xi Jinping, who told Taha on Tuesday that China appreciated the "unremitting efforts" Sudan has made in trying to end the Darfur crisis.

More than five years of conflict in Sudan's western region of Darfur have killed 200,000 people and driven 2.5 million from their homes, international experts say. Khartoum puts the death toll at 10,000.

Rights groups say China's engagement with Sudan fans the violence there with investments that they say prop up its government, and have called on China to leverage its ties to do more to push Khartoum to resolve the conflict.

The issue also prompted film director Steven Spielberg to quit as an artistic adviser to the Beijing Olympics and forced China defend its right to hold the Games, which open on Aug. 8.

China has highlighted its development aid to Sudan, the engineering corps it deployed to join the hybrid United Nations- African Union peacekeeping force there and says its trade is creating wealth for Sudan's people.

In the remarks to Taha, Hu urged the international community to increase aid to Darfur, especially development aid.

During Taha's visit, the two countries signed deals on agricultural cooperation that would see China help Sudan build a pilot agricultural centre and send agricultural training experts there, Xinhua news agency reported.

Taha also criticised what he called attempts by some foreign countries to make Darfur into an international issue.

"Their attempts infringe on Sudan's sovereignty," Xinhua quoted him as saying. (Reporting by Lindsay Beck; Editing by David Fogarty)

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