China said yesterday its military spending would top US$100 billion this year — a double-digit increase over last year — in a move likely to fuel concerns about Beijing’s rapid military buildup.
The defense budget will rise 11.2 percent to 670.27 billion yuan (US$106.41 billion), National People’s Congress spokesperson Li Zhaoxing (李肇星) said, citing a budget report submitted to the country’s legislature.
The figure marks a slowdown from last year when spending rose by 12.7 percent, but is still likely to fuel worries over China’s growing assertiveness in the Asia-Pacific region and push its neighbors to forge closer ties with the US.
Li described the budget as “relatively low” as a percentage of GDP compared with other countries and said it was aimed at “safeguarding sovereignty, national security and territorial integrity.”
“We have a large territory and a long coastline, but our defense spending is relatively low compared with other major countries,” Li told reporters. “It will not in the least pose a threat to other countries.”
China has been increasing its military spending by double digits for most of the past decade, during which time its economy, now the world’s second largest, has grown at a blistering pace.
The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) — the world’s largest with an estimated 2.3 million troops — is hugely secretive about its defense programs, but insists its modernization is purely defensive in nature.
The rapid military buildup has nevertheless set alarm bells ringing across Asia and in Washington, which announced in January a defense strategy focused on countering China’s rising power.
Analysts said the smaller-than-expected increase in spending this year was an attempt by Beijing to ease concerns in the US and the region about its growing military might.
“It is doubtful whether the message will get across because most countries know that the real budget is at least double the published one,” said Willy Lam (林和立), a leading China expert at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
Lam said funding for modernizing the country’s military was not included in the published budget, which mostly covered salaries for defense personnel and maintenance of existing equipment.
Money for research and development of modern weaponry “comes from elsewhere,” he said.
Taiwan-based PLA expert Arthur Ding (丁樹範) said the still considerable growth in this year’s budget would push “regional countries to try to build closer ties with the United States.”
“I think the regional countries will be really concerned about that,” Ding said. “China has to explain and try to convince the regional countries why they need such a high growth rate.”
China began revamping the PLA in earnest after a troubled 1979 incursion into Vietnam, when the neighbors vied for influence over Southeast Asia.
China’s defense budget is expected to double between last year and 2015 and outstrip the combined spending of all other key defense markets in the Asia-Pacific region, global research group IHS said last month.
FALSE DOCUMENTS? Actor William Liao said he was ‘voluntarily cooperating’ with police after a suspect was accused of helping to produce false medical certificates Police yesterday questioned at least six entertainers amid allegations of evasion of compulsory military service, with Lee Chuan (李銓), a member of boy band Choc7 (超克7), and actor Daniel Chen (陳大天) among those summoned. The New Taipei City District Prosecutors’ Office in January launched an investigation into a group that was allegedly helping men dodge compulsory military service using falsified medical documents. Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) has been accused of being one of the group’s clients. As the investigation expanded, investigators at New Taipei City’s Yonghe Precinct said that other entertainers commissioned the group to obtain false documents. The main suspect, a man surnamed
The government is considering polices to increase rental subsidies for people living in social housing who get married and have children, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said yesterday. During an interview with the Plain Law Movement (法律白話文) podcast, Cho said that housing prices cannot be brought down overnight without affecting banks and mortgages. Therefore, the government is focusing on providing more aid for young people by taking 3 to 5 percent of urban renewal projects and zone expropriations and using that land for social housing, he said. Single people living in social housing who get married and become parents could obtain 50 percent more
DEMOGRAPHICS: Robotics is the most promising answer to looming labor woes, the long-term care system and national contingency response, an official said Taiwan is to launch a five-year plan to boost the robotics industry in a bid to address labor shortages stemming from a declining and aging population, the Executive Yuan said yesterday. The government approved the initiative, dubbed the Smart Robotics Industry Promotion Plan, via executive order, senior officials told a post-Cabinet meeting news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s population decline would strain the economy and the nation’s ability to care for vulnerable and elderly people, said Peter Hong (洪樂文), who heads the National Science and Technology Council’s (NSTC) Department of Engineering and Technologies. Projections show that the proportion of Taiwanese 65 or older would
Democracies must remain united in the face of a shifting geopolitical landscape, former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) told the Copenhagen Democracy Summit on Tuesday, while emphasizing the importance of Taiwan’s security to the world. “Taiwan’s security is essential to regional stability and to defending democratic values amid mounting authoritarianism,” Tsai said at the annual forum in the Danish capital. Noting a “new geopolitical landscape” in which global trade and security face “uncertainty and unpredictability,” Tsai said that democracies must remain united and be more committed to building up resilience together in the face of challenges. Resilience “allows us to absorb shocks, adapt under
RSS