China announces ambitious military spending plan

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2011-03-05

China on Saturday revealed that its military spending will rise 12.6 percent in 2011 to 583.6 billion renminbi, or about 88.6 billion dollars.

The announcement means that Beijing has decided to resume double-digit annual increases in military spending that was interrupted in 2010, when spending rose only 7.5 percent, the New York Times reports.

Since 1989, the Chinese military budget has risen by an average of 12.9 percent per year, according to GlobalSecurity.org, a private organization that maintains an online database of military-related information.

Many analysts, including those in the Pentagon, say that China's actual military spending is probably considerably greater than the reported sums.

The resumption of rapid growth follows a year in which China's neighbors have expressed concern about the military's increasingly muscular behavior in waters off its Pacific coast and along the tense border with India.

A spokesman, Li Zhaoxing, however, said China's military is a defensive force and that it "will not pose a threat to any country."

Source: ANI

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