China to raise defence budget by 7 percent

China will raise its 2017 defence budget by around 7 percent, a spokesperson for the annual session of the country’s top legislature has said.

Fu Ying, spokesperson for the 12th National People’s Congress (NPC) annual session, said:

“China’s military capacity building will be continued. This is the requirement for safeguarding our national sovereignty and security.

But in the meantime, we must also have the capability to defend our sovereignty, our rights and interests. In particular, we must guard against outside forces from interfering with such issues.”

Fu, according to reports, noted that China’s defence spending accounts for only about 1.3 percent of the country’s GDP, compared with NATO members’ pledge to dedicate at least 2 percent.

This is one of the nations slowest defence budget rises in recent times, for example, in 2009 the figure was about 15 percent.