Rockets on the background of the Chinese flag
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China is set to increase its defense spending by 7.2% to 1.67 trillion yuan in 2024, according to a budget report released by the Ministry of Finance on Tuesday, as part of the country's annual parliamentary meetings in Beijing.
This year's military budget announcement comes against the backdrop of several People's Liberation Army generals, including the country's former Defense Minister Li Changfu, losing their posts amid President Xi Jinping's wide-ranging anti-corruption investigation last year.
The expansion of China's military budget for 2024 follows a 7.2% increase last year, a 7.1% rise in 2022, a 6.8% increase in 2021, a 6.6% increase in 2020, and a 7.5% growth in 2019, according to the data. Official.
China's official military budget is second only to the United States in the world, although some unofficial estimates suggest that the scale of Beijing's military spending may be larger than officially claimed.
China maintains its claims over self-governing Taiwan, and President Xi Jinping considers reunification a “historic inevitability.” In a government work report also released on Tuesday, Beijing pledged to “firmly oppose separatist activities aimed at 'Taiwan independence' and external interference.”
From land border skirmishes with India a few years ago to confrontations in the South China Sea with Southeast Asian countries more recently, tensions between Beijing and its neighbors have escalated.
On Tuesday, the Philippines accused the Chinese Coast Guard of carrying out “dangerous maneuvers” that led to a Chinese ship colliding with one of its ships on its way to Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea.
This is not the first time Chinese ships have clashed with Philippine vessels on resupply missions for forces stationed on an old warship that Manila decommissioned more than a decade ago.
The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague ruled in 2016 that China's claims to sovereignty over large parts of the South China Sea had no basis in international law – a ruling that Beijing rejected.
Beijing has also expressed its dissatisfaction with the joint exercises and patrols conducted by the United States and other Western naval powers with various Asian countries in international waters that Beijing claims as its own.
– CNBC's Evelyn Cheng contributed to this story.
