At the March 4 press conference during the Fourth Session of the 11th National People's Congress (NPC), spokesman Li Zhaoxing said that China will raise its defense budget by about 12.7 percent to 601.1 billion yuan ($91.5 billion), accounting for 6 percent of this year's budgetary fiscal expenditure. The percentage is slightly down compared to that of previous years.

But the two-digit growth has again sparked heated debate among foreign media. Some of them question the use of the money and worry about the influence of this spending on China's neighbors.

However, Major General Luo Yuan, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and senior researcher with the Chinese People's Liberation Army Military Science Academy, said in an interview with Xinhua News Agency that the growth is slow and reasonable. Edited excerpts follow:

A foreign reporter once asked me: Why does China raise its defense budget? And my answer was: Why not?

First, any country, when facing a threat, will increase its national defense spending. As China is facing occasional instability in surrounding regions, why can't we increase the defense spending?

Second, countries around the world are all modernizing their military forces, and the world is undergoing a new round of military transformation. Why can't China follow such a trend?

Third, the missions of Chinese military forces are expanding. We are now in the face of not only traditional threats but also non-traditional threats. For example, our troops have been recently involved in the evacuation of Chinese citizens from Libya. China now has to face a wide range of military missions [aroud the world], including maritime search and rescue, joint military exercises and international peacekeeping, so it is quite reasonable for China to increase its defense spending.

Fourth, the achievements of the reform and opening up should be shared by the whole society. As budgets in other areas are increasing, the military budgets should be increased as well.

Fifth, commodity prices in China are on the rise, especially for water, electricity and oil, which are closely related to the operation of the armed forces. So the increase of military spending should be made to keep pace with the rising consumer price index.

Last but not least, China's national defense budget remained very slow or even showed negative growth during the first decade of the reform and opening up. The current two-digit growth is just a compensation of past growth.

There are two principles in drafting the national defense budget: moderate and reasonable. Moderate means China would not raise its military spending for an arms race or for the purpose of boosting the size [of the armed forces]. Reasonable means the spending has to meet the necessary demand for national defense. It is defensive in nature and aims at safeguarding the national sovereignty and territorial integrity of China.

In terms of transparency, there's no absolute transparency in the world. Now China has joined the United Nations Register of Conventional Arms, and it has already made every possible effort to make its budget transparent.