Warning against Japan’s military build-up surfaces at Beijing Xiangshan conference

Chinese panellists and experts at the Xiangshan Forum have warned against Japan’s remilitarisation amid reports that Tokyo is considering raising its midterm defence spending to 3.5 per cent of GDP.

Japan might raise its midterm budget to 3-3.5 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product in line with Nato and other US allies, Bloomberg reported earlier this week, as the US pushes its allies in Asia and Europe to boost their own defences.

At the three-day defence gathering in Beijing on Thursday, Zhou Rong, senior fellow with Renmin University of China’s Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies, said the US was not the only influence on Japan’s decision to expand military spending.

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“Their increase in military expenditure by 3.5 per cent of GDP does indeed have an American factor. It also has to do with the frantic clamour of their own domestic conservative forces, who hold a hostile attitude towards China or perceive China as a security threat,” Zhou said in an interview on the sidelines of the event, which ended on Thursday.

Japan has been accelerating its defence spending and will revise its landmark three security documents before the end of the year as part of its military build-up under Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, whose comments on Taiwan set off a decline in Sino-Japanese ties.