New law may authorise Chinese military to fight terrorists abroad
Draft law would authorise deployments if other countries agreed
China was weighing up a proposal to let its troops head overseas on counterterrorism missions, analysts said, citing military officials attending a security forum in Beijing last week.
The draft of the country's first counterterrorism law includes clauses that would authorise the army and the paramilitary police to carry out counterterrorism missions abroad if the deployment had the consent of the countries involved, Chinese delegates told the Xiangshan Forum last week, according to analysts at the regional security meeting.
The draft legislation was submitted to the National People's Congress Standing Committee in October and is not yet approved.
Li Wei, a counterterrorism analyst at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, said the legislation would authorise Chinese troops to fight terrorism beyond its borders.
"[The draft] also makes clear the prerequisites for such an operation - the consent of all other countries involved," Li said.
He said Chinese troops rarely ventured abroad, with the most recent instance being in 2004 when armed police were sent to guard the embassy in Iraq.