Chinese President Xi Jinping will gather more than 20 world leaders for a regional security forum in China next week, a powerful show of solidarity from the Global South in the age of Donald Trump. At the same time, it will help sanctions-hit Russia achieve its latest diplomatic breakthrough.
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit will be held from August 31 to September 1 in the northern Chinese port city of Tianjin. In addition to Russian President Vladimir Putin, leaders from Central Asia, the Middle East, South Asia and Southeast Asia will also be invited.
The summit will be attended by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who will visit China for the first time in more than seven years, amid attempts by the two countries to reduce tensions between them, which were sparked by deadly border clashes in 2020.
Modi last stood shoulder to shoulder with Putin and Xi at last year's BRICS summit in the Russian city of Kazan, despite Western leaders turning their backs on the Russian leader amid the war in Ukraine. Russian embassy officials in Delhi said last week that Moscow hopes to hold trilateral talks with China and India soon.
“Xi will want to use the summit as an opportunity to show what a post-American world order is starting to look like and that all the White House efforts since January against China, Iran, Russia and now India have not had the desired effect,“ said Eric Olander, editor-in-chief of the media initiative The China-Global South Project.
“Just look at how much the BRICS shook (US President) Donald Trump. That is why these groups were created,“ said Olander.
This year's summit will be the largest since the SCO was founded in 2001, a Chinese foreign ministry official said last week, calling the bloc “an important force in building a new type of international relations“.
The security-focused bloc began as a group of six Eurasian countries, expanding in recent years to include 10 permanent members and 16 observer states with whom it also holds dialogue. The SCO's remit has also expanded from security and counter-terrorism to economic and military cooperation.
“Unclear” implementation
According to analysts, enlargement is a priority for many of the participating countries, without achieving significant results in cooperation over the years. Analysts also note that China values the appearance of solidarity of the Global South against the United States at a time of political instability and geopolitical change.
“The exact vision of the SCO and its practical implementation are quite unclear. It is a platform with increasing traction, which helps to push ideas“, said Manoj Kewalramani, chairman of the Indo-Pacific Studies Program at the Takshashila Institute, a think tank in Bangalore.“
“But the SCO's effectiveness in addressing substantive security issues remains very limited,” he added.
Tensions between member states India and Pakistan continue. The SCO defense ministers' meeting in June failed to adopt a joint declaration after India objected, claiming that the declaration did not mention the deadly April 22 attack on Hindu tourists in Indian-held Kashmir, which led to the worst clashes between India and Pakistan in decades.
Delhi refused to join the SCO's joint condemnation of Israeli attacks on Iran, a member state, earlier in June.
But the recent easing of tensions between India and China after five years of heightened border conflicts, as well as the Trump administration's renewed tariff pressure on Delhi, have raised hopes of a positive outcome from the Xi Jinping-Modi meeting on the sidelines of the summit.
“It is likely that (Delhi) will swallow its pride and let "This year's SCO issues are behind us in an effort to maintain momentum in reducing tensions with China, which is currently a key priority for Modi," said Olander.
Analysts expect India and China to announce further phased measures to address the border issue, such as troop withdrawals, easing trade and visa restrictions, cooperation in new areas including climate, and broader government-to-people engagement.
While no major policy announcements are expected at the meeting, experts caution against underestimating the bloc's appeal to countries in the Global South.
“This summit is about (political) visibility, really powerful visibility”, said Olander.
Modi is expected to leave the country after the summit, while Putin will stay for the World War II military parade in Beijing later this week - an unusually long stay outside Russia.
Translated from English by Petya Dimitrova, BTA