Senior officers from the People's Liberation Army (PLA) were grouped into a military academy Monday for high-tech training to enhance the PLA's high-tech ability, according to a report in the PLA Daily.

According to a plan approved by the Central Military Commission, the training is supposed to meet the needs of China's ongoing military reform.

The courses will focus on the learning of information technology and the study of wars in the information age and the army's information-based construction, said the paper.

The academy was set up at the National University of Defense Technology in Hefei, capital of central China's Anhui Province. A group of specially selected academicians and experts have been arranged to teach the officers.

The PLA had long ago decided to further improve education for its military officers by enhancing military science education and giving priority to engineering courses closely related to new, high-tech weapons and equipment and information technology.

China had decided to send an additional 1,600 military officers in the next few years for postgraduate education at 29 universities and colleges, including the prestigious Qinghua University and Beijing University.

As part of a program launched by the Ministry of Education and the armed forces in 2001, nearly 3,000 military officers have since been trained at selected non-military institutions of higher learning.

During an earlier meeting of PLA delegates on postgraduate education, Defense Minister Cao Gangchuan said the armed forces have brought forth more than 4,100 graduates with doctorate degrees and over 22,500 graduates with master's degree since 1992.

(Xinhua News Agency October 15, 2003)