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Xi Jinping
ChinaDiplomacy

Xi Jinping calls on SCO members to team up for bigger global tech-security role

The world is at a crossroads and the group should shoulder its responsibility, Chinese president says at Bishkek summit

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SCO leaders attend the annual summit in Bishkek on Tuesday.  Photo: EPA/Kremlin pool
Dewey Sim
The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation should take on a bigger global role in technology and security, Chinese President Xi Jinping said on Tuesday, describing the Eurasian bloc as having vast potential.
At the SCO’s summit in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, Xi said the group had shown “strong vitality” since its founding 25 years ago amid the “sobering lessons of the Cold War”.

In a veiled reference to Washington’s system of military alliances, Xi said a key lesson from the bloc’s quarter of a century of cooperation was “finding the right way to coexist without alliance, confrontation or targeting any third party”.

“Its most significant achievement has been its steady growth into a new type of regional cooperation organisation that now spans the widest territory, encompasses the largest population, and holds the greatest development potential in the world,” Xi said, according to state news agency Xinhua.

However, he said, the shadow of the war lingered and the world was at a crossroads, with rivalries between dialogue and confrontation, win-win cooperation and zero-sum competition, and multilateralism versus unilateralism.

“Standing at a crossroads concerning the future and destiny of humankind, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation should bravely shoulder its responsibility and proactively guide the course of history,” Xi said.

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