Increase the tension. China has announced that it will make a new increase in its defense budget. The reason, according to Xi Jinping’s government, is to protect the national government against instabilities and external threats.
They would come mainly from two countries: the United States and Taiwan. The Chinese executive wants to strengthen itself militarily against a potential military confrontation with the United States of America and a possible invasion of Taiwan.
In this way, the President of the People’s Republic of China announced at the National People’s Congress a 7.2% increase in military spending, which means that the Asian giant will invest 224,790 million dollars (about 210,000 million dollars) for defense. This is the largest budget increase since 2019.
In particular, the outgoing prime minister, Li Keqiang, emphasized the importance of “focusing” on army training and “combat readiness”.
Timid economic growth
Despite the significant amount of resources that will be dedicated to defense, in economic terms the Government of China has announced an objective growth of “around 5%”, one of the lowest in decades, as reported by AFP.
However, Li Keqiang confirmed that “the Chinese economy is experiencing a solid recovery” after three years of slow growth due to the pandemic and the harsh health restrictions applied by Beijing.
In fact, China’s GDP has grown by only 3% by 2022, one of the worst results in 40 years. “China’s economic development is met with many unexpected events both at home and abroad, such as the epidemic,” Li Keqiang admitted.
However, “under the strong leadership of the Central Committee of the Party, we have effectively organized the prevention and control of epidemics and economic and social issues,” the prime minister added in the release.
The aforementioned economic data was presented at the opening of the 69-day parliamentary session, which should announce the election of Xi Jinping as president for another five years. In October he was already confirmed in his duties at the head of the Communist Party (PCCh).
