Taipei  - Taiwan on Tuesday admitted it is mulling cutting its armed forces, but denied reports that the cuts could be as much as one-third of its troops.

"Regarding the adjustment of the size of our military forces, it is still being planned. We have not made a decision yet and all possibilities are under consideration," the Broadcasting Corp of China quoted Ho An-chi, a Defence Ministry official in charge of personnel planning, as saying.

The statement came in response to Monday's local news reports that the government was planning to cut the armed forces from the current 275,000 troops to 180,000.

The reduction, to be carried out over four years, is due to the high cost of recruiting voluntary conscripts since 2003, Taiwan newspapers said Monday.

Public reaction to the report was mixed, with some people fearing it will weaken Taiwan's defence against China while others said there was no need to maintain a large armed force.

Lawmaker Shuai Hua-min said that during the Cold War days, Taiwan built a large military hoping to recover the mainland, lost by the Chinese Nationalists to the Communists at the end of the Chinese Civil War in 1949.

"But since there is no imminent danger of war, it is the best time to make the restructuring," he said. (dpa)