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BEIJING : China has appointed a military officer with deep knowledge of its space programme and its plans for potential war with Taiwan to a key job in the People's Liberation Army, a report said Saturday.
In the report in the Liberation Army Daily about a meeting with a Ugandan visitor, General Chen Bingde was described as chief of the general staff of the People's Liberation Army.
It was the first indication in any of the Chinese mainstream media that the crucial post no longer belonged to Liang Guanglie.
It was unclear exactly when the job changed hands, or why.
Born in 1940, Liang is approaching retirement age, but Chen is only one year his junior and therefore would seem a strange choice for a successor.
The chief of the general staff is the key officer in charge of military modernisation.
The change in the top position emerged in the media just three weeks ahead of the crucial 17th Communist Party Congress, which will chart the course for China over the next five years.
Several crucial personnel changes have taken place in the run-up to that event, including a new foreign minister and finance minister.
From 2004 until now, Chen has been director general of the General Armaments Department, which put him in charge of the highly prestigious space programme.
In the late 1990s, he was commander of the Nanjing Military Region, an area that would become crucial if war were ever to break out between China and Taiwan. - AFP/ch
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