beijing chinas peoples liberation army pla has banned its personnel from joining overseas nongovernmental organisations ngos over confidentiality and security concerns a new regulation issued by the plas general political department has banned people serving in the military from joining foreign ngos official media has reported overseas ngos refer to nongovernmental and nonprofit groups legally established abroad including associations academic societies chambers of commerce foundations research institutes the pla daily reported it was out of confidentiality concerns song zhongping a beijingbased military expert told global times many foreign ngos are actually set up to steal military information by recruiting chinese soldiers which have happened song said he added that some ngos attempt to brainwash soldiers into conducting peaceful evolution joining foreign ngos is politically sensitive and the pla has to remain united the working group in charge of implementing the regulation said fang gongbin a professor at chinas pla national defence university said that soldiers joining overseas ngo is uncommon organisations or associations under the pla which have not registered with the ministry of civil affairs will be dissolved including those posing as research centres and hobbyoriented clubs the working group said many of the associations which have no essential functions were set up primarily to feed the vanity of senior military officials song said the pla has a huge cultural troops whose officials have been given senior military ranks pla worlds largest army with 23 million troops is currently trimming down its size last month president xi jinping who also heads the military has announced the plan to cut there lakh troops by 2017 while speaking at the massive military parade held to commemorate the 70th anniversary of victory against japan during wwii