Chinese President Xi Jinping has urged breakthroughs in reform of the country’s armed forces by 2020, vowing to reorganize the current military administration structure and military command system.

As a result, the country will streamline its military structure and cut 300,000 office workers and personnel from non-combating military departments.

Xi, also Chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remarks at a military meeting on Thursday.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, who is also chairman of the Central Military Commission, chairs a meeting on reforming the armed forces in Beijing.

According to the announcement, the reform plan will give the Central Military Commission more power – it will be in charge of both administration and command of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). It will create battle command zones to focus on combat, and commanders of different services will be expected to focus on development of their respective services.

The structural reform aims to better integrate the command over the PLA, Xi added.

He also vowed to root out corruption in the army.

China will advance the “rule of law” over the armed forces and establish a new discipline inspection commission within the Central Military Commission, Xi added.

China to reduce military by 300,000 troops

China will cut the number of its troops by 300,000, President Xi Jinping said Thursday. The total number of troops in the Chinese PLA has gone down from 6.27 million to 2 million.

Quick Facts about People’s Liberation Army (PLA)

Do You Know ? Name of Chinese armed forces: People’s Liberation Army (PLA) PLA Founded in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province on August 1st, 1927. Total Army Members: 2.11 million  (2014 collected) ReserveTroops: 3.25 million  (2014 collected) Budget of National Defense in 2013: US$114.3 billion (720.2. billion yuan RMB ) Chairman of Central Military Commission: Xi Jinping

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