Slovak President Peter Pellegrini said on Wednesday that formulating long-term development plans and ensuring their steady implementation are crucial for any country's future, pointing to China's remarkable changes over the years as a prime example.
In an interview with China Media Group (CMG) in Beijing, Pellegrini underscored the importance of national development planning, saying that the absence of a clear strategy had cost Slovakia valuable opportunities over the past decades.
"I see a tremendous change in China, and I split it in my view into two areas. One is hardware -- let's say, I see incredible investments in infrastructure: new highways, bridges, railways, high-speed trains, and these kinds of things. But then also software. That means implementing new technology into daily life, implementing the five-year plan or even the long-term plan, because this is something that I believe is the right way to have plans. Because I have to say that we did make a mistake after the Velvet Revolution -- we stopped planning things," said the president.
He said that Slovak policymakers have been studying and drawing on China's planning system, hoping to absorb the essence of its approach to help drive their own country's development.
"We were missing long-term plans and strategies in our policy, and that is not good for the country. So we are already really watching and following the system of planning here. And also now we decided in the Slovakia -- the Slovak government decided to create a new vision for Slovakia for 2040. So I hope that this will help us to reach our targets, to define our priorities for the decades, (and to achieve) early implementation of the new technologies in different areas in our daily lives. So there I see the potential," he said.
Slovak president hails coherence of China's development planning system
Rally participants gathered in the Japanese capital on Aug 9, which also marked the 81st anniversary of the Nagasaki atomic bombing, to voice strong opposition to the government's push to boost defense spending and revise the war-renouncing Article 9 of the national Constitution.
Holding anti-war placards, chanting anti-war slogans, protesters warned that remilitarizing the nation would betray its pacifist ideals and endanger future generations.
"Defense spending keeps increasing. Based on Article 9 of the Constitution, Japan pledged never to wage war again, yet it keeps strengthening its military. I find this extremely dangerous. They are also trying to revise Article 9. So I believe that for the sake of future young people and children, Article 9 must never be revised. Japan decided never to repeat the mistakes of waging a war after its defeat in WWII. I think we should continue to safeguard that commitment," said a rally participant.
For many in the crowd, the shadow of Hiroshima and Nagasaki remains a powerful moral compass as they believe that militarization offers no path forward for a nation that knows the devastation of war firsthand.
"Japan is the only country in the world to have suffered atomic bombings. Yet now Japan is going to deploy missiles. I believe Japan must never possess nuclear weapons," said another rally participant.
"I believe Japan has no future if it goes down the path of militarization. Nuclear weapons are absolutely bad for Japan," said a third woman, also a rally participant.
Beyond moral objections, some demonstrators said that Japan's economic vulnerabilities articulate that saber-rattling is a luxury the country cannot afford.
"I can't help but wonder what on earth a country with only a 36 percent food self-sufficiency rate would be fighting with. I have always been opposed to war, and I'm deeply dissatisfied with what the Takaichi administration is doing now," said another rally participant.
Other rally participants said that seeing revision of the Constitution could unleash unchecked military expansion, stripping away the very safeguards that have kept Japan at peace for eight decades.
"Article 9 of the Constitution is the key. If the nature of the Self-Defense Forces is elevated to a level beyond collective self-defense, which is explicitly written into the Constitution, it will allow the authority of the Self-Defense Forces to expand without limit. So no matter what, I want to prevent this from happening," said one more rally participant.
Japanese citizens rally against Takaichi's military expansion, constitutional revision
