Singapore, 6 Jun (ZXS) -- Directly hit the defense minister's "incense meeting" speech: Greeting with courtesy, narrating with reason, and promoting peace with sincerity

China News Agency reporter Li Chun

On the morning of the 4th local time, Chinese State Councilor and Minister of National Defense Li Shangfu opened his first speech at the Shangri-La Dialogue with a military salute. By elaborating on China's new security initiative, Li Shangfu clarified China's position, responded to the concerns of all parties, and conveyed China's voice of peace and cooperation.

"Respect", "equality" and "cooperation" are high-frequency words in China's defense minister's speech. At present, the unprecedented changes in a century are accelerating, and China calls for replacing bullying and bullying with mutual respect, transcending the law of the jungle with fairness and justice, eliminating confrontation and conflict with mutual trust and consultation, and preventing confrontation between camps with openness and inclusiveness.

"The road is long and the road is long, and the line is coming. We should join hands to build an Asia-Pacific community with a shared future, safeguard regional stability, prosperity and development, and jointly build a better Asia-Pacific. Li Shangfu said.

In the view of Qi Dapeng, director of the Strategic Consulting Center of the National Defense University, Li Shangfu's speech stood at the height of common security and common development of regional countries, not only focusing on China's own development and core interests, but also advocating the joint construction of a regional security mutual trust system, a security rule system and a multilateral security mechanism. "This is completely different from the practice of relevant countries in promoting bloc politics, which is two ways of thinking and two patterns."

The Chinese delegation has always been the focus of attention of all parties attending the "Xiangxiang Meeting", as can be seen from the Q&A session after the speech of the Chinese Defense Ministers' Conference. Experts and scholars from different countries and international organizations raised 10 questions to the Chinese defense minister, including hot and sensitive topics such as Sino-US relations and the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

In response to a question on freedom of navigation in the South China Sea, Li Shangfu made it clear that the key is to prevent the practice of "navigation hegemony" in the name of "freedom of navigation."

In response to a question on Sino-US relations, Li Shangfu pointed out that China is open to exchanges and dialogues between the two countries and two militaries, while stressing: "If mutual respect is not possible, exchanges and dialogues will not have good results." ”

On the Taiwan issue, Li Shangfu firmly pointed out that Taiwan is an inalienable part of China, and the Chinese Government and Chinese armed forces will never allow national separatism to occur, especially not allowing "Taiwan independence" separatist forces and external interference forces to separate Taiwan from China.

Speaking of strengthening communication and cooperation, Li Shangfu said that in the past two days of attending the meeting, he has had friendly exchanges with defense officials from more than 10 countries and international organizations. Carrying out more, deeper and more extensive exchanges to promote regional peace, stability and security is an important consensus held by all parties.

Having listened to the Chinese defense minister's speech and Q&A, Beth Aknonero from Papua New Guinea believes that Li Shangfu's answers are straight to the point. In his speech, Minister Li talked about actively promoting dialogue and communication to resolve the crisis. Indeed, as he said, it is very important that all parties come together and work together in the form of cooperation. ”

Former Indonesian Deputy Foreign Minister Dino Paddy Jalal also said that the Chinese defense minister's speech was reasonable, allowing all parties to understand how China views military development planning, geopolitical relations, as well as China-US relations and international order. "Policy analysts around the world will study and interpret this speech."

The Chinese defense minister's participation in the meeting showed the image of the Chinese military as a civilized and open state. The guests also valued the opportunity to communicate face-to-face with the Chinese defense minister. Chipman, director of the British Institute for International Strategic Studies (IISS), who chaired the meeting, also said that this was the first time since the current "incense meeting" that he "dragged the hall" at the plenary meeting.

Towards the end of the plenary session, Li Shangfu once again said, "I hope to have time for more in-depth exchanges with experts on security issues and development issues, so that we can have a clearer understanding of the views and positions of all countries and at the same time, you can better understand China's views and positions." ”

The statement of the Chinese defense minister has won praise from many parties. "This sends a very positive signal." Qi Dapeng said that the premise of defense cooperation is communication and exchanges, first of all, exchange of security concepts and ideas, understanding each other's policies and concepts, building mutual trust, and then deepening cooperation at different levels and in different aspects, so as to jointly contribute more to peace, stability and development in the Asia-Pacific region. (End)