AFP, BEIJING: China will raise its defence spending by seven to eight percent this year, a top official said Friday, a smaller increase than the double-digit rises of the past as Beijing seeks a more efficient military.
At the same time the rising power is increasing its military heft and asserting its territorial claims in the South China Sea, raising tensions with its neighbours and with Washington.
“China’s military budget will continue to grow this year but the margin will be lower than last year’s and the previous years,” said Fu Ying, spokeswoman for the National People’s Congress (NPC), the Communist-controlled parliament.
“It will be between seven and eight percent.”
The exact increase will be announced on Saturday at the opening of the NPC, Fu told reporters.
The reduced increase comes as China under President Xi Jinping seeks to craft a more efficient and effective People’s Liberation Army (PLA), the world’s largest standing military.
It unveiled a revamped military structure at the start of the year, establishing a new army general command and a Rocket Force to oversee its strategic missiles.
At a giant military parade in Beijing last year to
commemorate the 70th anniversary of Japan’s World War II defeat, Xi announced the PLA would be reduced by 300,000 personnel.
The parade also saw more than a dozen “carrier-killer” anti-ship ballistic missiles rolling through the streets of the capital, with state television calling them a “trump card” in potential conflicts and “one of China’s key weapons in asymmetric warfare”.
Analysts say that for a fraction of the cost of an aircraft carrier—for decades the mainstay of Washington’s ability to project power around the world—the DF-21D missile threatens to alter the military balance in the Pacific.
At the parade, Xi said China’s troops would “carry out the noble mission of upholding world peace”, faithfully protect national security, and would never “seek hegemony”.
Fu said Friday the country was “pushing forward military reform” to achieve those goals.