BEIJING, March 18 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese defense spokesperson on Wednesday denounced Japan for hyping up China's military budget, saying that it is nothing more than a thief crying "stop thief" so as to find excuses for its own hidden ambition of military expansion.

Jiang Bin, a spokesperson for the Ministry of National Defense, made the comment in response to Japanese politicians' misinterpretation about China's defense expenditure.

"China's defense spending accounts for less than 1.5 percent of its GDP. It is significantly lower than that of major military powers like the United States, and is also below the global average and the NATO benchmark of over 2 percent of GDP," Jiang said.

China's defense budget maintains a reasonable, moderate, and restrained growth. Such increase is solely meant to safeguard China's sovereignty, security, and development interests, and to maintain world peace and stability, he said.

By comparison, Jiang added, Japan's defense budget has grown for 14 years in a row and increased over 60 percent in the past five years, reaching 2 percent of its GDP. Moreover, Japan's per capita military spending is more than three times that of China.

Japan has developed and deployed offensive weapons far beyond the needs for exclusive defense, and pursued remilitarization without ever a reckoning with its past atrocities, which Jiang said are the real threat to regional peace and stability.

"We urge the Japanese side to look at itself in the mirror more often, stop its misleading smearing campaigns, and never repeat the doomed mistake of militarism," said the spokesperson. ■