BEIJING: China\u2019s President Xi Jinping will host world leaders including Russia\u2019s Vladimir Putin and India\u2019s Narendra Modi from Sunday for a summit before a huge military parade as he seeks to showcase a non-Western style of regional collaboration.<\/p>\n
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit will be held Sunday and Monday, days before the military parade in nearby Beijing to mark 80 years since the end of World War II, which North Korea\u2019s Kim Jong Un will attend.<\/p>\n
The SCO comprises China, India, Russia, Pakistan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Belarus \u2014 with 16 more countries affiliated as observers or \u201cdialogue partners.\u201d<\/p>\n
China and Russia have used the organization \u2014 sometimes touted as a counter to the Western-dominated NATO military alliance \u2014 to deepen ties with Central Asian states.<\/p>\n
As China\u2019s claim over Taiwan and Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine have seen them clash with the United States and Europe, analysts say the SCO is one forum where they are trying to win influence.<\/p>\n
More than 20 leaders including Iranian and Turkish presidents Masoud Pezeshkian and Recep Tayyip Erdogan will attend the bloc\u2019s largest meeting since its founding in 2001.<\/p>\n
Hosting this many leaders gives Beijing a chance to \u201cdemonstrate convening power,\u201d said Lizzi Lee from the Asia Society Policy Institute.<\/p>\n
But substantial outcomes, she added, are not expected as the summit would be more about optics and agenda-setting.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe SCO runs by consensus, and when you have countries deeply divided on core issues like India and Pakistan, or China and India, in the same room, that naturally limits ambition,\u201d Lee told AFP.<\/p>\n
Beijing wants to show it can bring diverse leaders together and reinforce the idea that global governance is \u201cnot Western-dominated,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
Assistant Foreign Minister Liu Bin said Friday that the summit will bring stability in the face of \u201chegemonism and power politics,\u201d a veiled reference to the United States.<\/p>\n
Putin\u2019s attendance comes as Ukraine\u2019s President Volodymyr Zelensky insists that a meeting with him would be \u201cthe most effective way forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
While US President Donald Trump has pushed to broker a Ukraine-Russia summit, Moscow has ruled out any immediate Putin-Zelensky talks.<\/p>\n
Putin at the SCO summit will likely seek to demonstrate Russia\u2019s continued support from non-Western partners to promote its narratives of the cause of war and \u201chow the \u2018just\u2019 end of the war will look like,\u201d said Dylan Loh, an assistant professor at Singapore\u2019s Nanyang Technological University.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith Putin in the room, the war will hang over the proceedings,\u201d Asia Society\u2019s Lee said, but added that the topic of Ukraine would not be \u201cfront and center\u201d of the summit.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe SCO avoids topics that divide members, and this one obviously does,\u201d she told AFP.<\/p>\n
But Putin will want to show that he \u201cis not isolated, reaffirming the partnership with Xi, and keeping Russia visible in Eurasia,\u201d Lee added.<\/p>\n
Modi\u2019s visit is his first to China since 2018.<\/p>\n
The world\u2019s two most populous nations are intense rivals competing for influence across South Asia and fought a deadly border clash in 2020.<\/p>\n
A thaw began last October when Modi met with Xi for the first time in five years at a summit in Russia.<\/p>\n
Caught in geopolitical turbulence triggered by Trump\u2019s tariff war, they have moved to mend ties.<\/p>\n
\u201cChina will try its very best to pull out all stops to woo India, particularly capitalizing on India\u2019s trade issues with the US,\u201d said Lim Tai Wei, a professor and East Asia expert at Japan\u2019s Soka University.<\/p>\n
But fundamental differences between the countries cannot be resolved easily, he cautioned.<\/p>\n
\u201cTemporary respite or temperature-cooling, however, may be possible,\u201d Lim told AFP.<\/p>\n
Modi was not present at China\u2019s 2015 parade and it remains unclear if he will attend this year\u2019s.<\/p>\n
His attendance would be \u201ca barometer of where the geopolitical wind blows in the global contestation between the West and China,\u201d Lim said.<\/p>\n
China and India announced in August that they would restart direct flights, advance talks on their disputed border, and boost trade.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BEIJING: China\u2019s President Xi Jinping will host world leaders including Russia\u2019s Vladimir Putin and India\u2019s Narendra Modi from Sunday for a summit before a huge military parade as he seeks to showcase a non-Western style of regional collaboration. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit will be held Sunday and Monday, days before the military parade in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":499564,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-499552","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n