China's annual National People's Congress comes to an end

Last year’s climate summit in Copenhagen did little to improve China’s image in the West. The world’s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases was perceived as being less than helpful. Nor did it help that Prime Minister Wen Jiabao did not show up for a key meeting with the most important Western government heads but sent a relatively junior minister instead.

"We were not officially invited and still do not understand why today," Wen told reporters at a press conference at the end of the People’s Congress.

He then answered a journalist’s question about China’s role in the world: "You have formulated it in a very mild manner. Usually, I read about how arrogant we are and how we want to triumph over others. But the fact is that China will need another 100 years before it becomes a modern country.

China is peace-loving and doesn’t threaten any other country. We will never strive for hegemony. We are aware of our international responsibility. Both politically and economically."

7.5 percent increase in defense spending

This year, the People’s Congress approved the lowest increase – by 7.5 percent – in military expenses in two decades.

David Zweig, the Director of the Center on China's Transnational Relations at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, thought people were "overstating China’s military capability".

"We’ve heard expressions coming out of China, from hawks and the military people in the national defense university, that it’s time we should stretch ourselves, we can see that in 10 years we should be able to dominate the United States militarily. This is ridiculous. The Chinese spend a maximum of 100 or 120 billion dollars (73 to 87 billion euros) on defense and the United States spend five times that amount, year in year out.

"There are ways that China can fight, in what is called asymmetrical warfare where you can fight well even though you’re weaker. But China has no global military capacity beyond the South China Sea, the Straits of Taiwan and maybe the Sea of Japan, other than nuclear weapons. I think that the Chinese themselves, particularly the hawks, are overestimating their own capabilities."

Further cooperation with international companies

But what is not overestimated is China’s economic capacity, although at the press conference Wen Jiabao once again pointed out the uneven distribution of wealth and corruption levels could cause the country to falter.

The prime minister avoided the issue when asked about recent reports that Google might withdraw from China because of censorship and cyber-attacks but instead hinted at further cooperation with Western companies.

"We treat international companies fairly but I do admit that I have not nurtured close contacts with foreign business people. I would like to meet more of them in future."

"The yuan is not undervalued"

However, Wen insisted that China’s national currency, the yuan, would not be appreciated, as Western countries have been calling for. They accuse China of keeping its currency artificially low to create advantages for its own products but Wen rejected this argument.

"The yuan is not undervalued," he said. "One example is that the import of German products to China reached 76 billion euros (104 billion US dollars) in 2009 – that is a historic record."

Apart from debating the budget, military expenses and economic matters, the National People’s Congress also reviewed a series of less pressing draft laws.

One delegate proposed that husbands should pay their wives for doing the housework and raising children. Another called for divorce to be made more difficult. While one suggested that sports officials should not be judged according to the number of Olympic gold medals won by Chinese athletes, since this led them to resort to illegal means such as doping and age fraud.

Author: Astrid Freyeisen / act
Editor: Thomas Baerthlein