Ahmed Kamel – Egypt Daily News
In a significant geopolitical gathering, Chinese President Xi Jinping is hosting one of the most crucial summits in the history of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), bringing together leaders from Russia, India, Iran, Turkey, and nearly 20 other Eurasian countries. The summit, taking place in the northern port city of Tianjin, is being positioned by Beijing as a showcase for a new international order centered around China, especially as global tensions intensify and U.S. trade tariffs weigh heavily on key players in the region.
The summit, which officially begins Monday, is the first since Donald Trump’s return to the White House and comes at a time when the SCO faces numerous shared challenges, from ongoing U.S.-China and U.S.-India trade disputes to the war in Ukraine and the Iranian nuclear file. Tianjin, a symbol of China’s economic progress, has been transformed into a high-security zone with armored vehicles on standby and traffic severely restricted. Banners celebrating “Tianjin spirit” and “mutual trust” between Moscow and Beijing line the streets in both Mandarin and Russian.
The importance of this summit stems not only from the breadth of participants but also from the weight of the issues at hand. With 10 member states and 16 observer and partner countries, the SCO collectively represents nearly half the global population and over 23% of the world’s GDP. Founded in 2001, the organization has increasingly been viewed as a geopolitical counterweight to NATO, particularly in energy and security cooperation.
Sunday’s agenda included high-profile bilateral meetings. Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived quietly earlier in the day, heading a sizable political and economic delegation. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi landed a day prior, marking his first visit to China since 2018, signaling a thaw in relations between Asia’s two giants. Both leaders were welcomed personally by Xi, underscoring the symbolic significance of their presence.
Observers note that the summit is as much about image as substance. The SCO offers China an opportunity to flex its diplomatic and military influence, portraying itself as a stabilizing force amid global fragmentation. Official Chinese communications have promoted the event as an example of “multipolarity” an implicit rebuke of perceived U.S. unilateralism.
Further underscoring the summit’s weight, Xi has extended personal invitations to leaders like Putin and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian to remain in China through Wednesday to attend a massive military parade in Beijing commemorating the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II in Asia.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, in a rare trip abroad, is also expected to stand alongside Xi during the festivities highlighting Pyongyang’s growing alignment with Beijing and Moscow. Intelligence sources from South Korea and Western agencies claim that North Korea has sent thousands of troops to support Russian operations in Ukraine.
In parallel, the summit sets the stage for another round of intense diplomacy. Xi is expected to hold talks with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on the Ukraine conflict and with Iran’s Pezeshkian on the future of Tehran’s nuclear program. A meeting with Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh is also planned to discuss economic cooperation in fields like digital technology and artificial intelligence.
The encounter between Xi and Modi was especially watched, given the fraught relationship between China and India. Despite a violent border clash in 2020, both countries appear to be working toward rapprochement, particularly in light of shared grievances over American tariffs. Xi referred to the evolving partnership as the “dance of the dragon and the elephant,” emphasizing the need for cooperation between the two nations, which together account for 2.8 billion people. Modi echoed this sentiment, highlighting the “stable and peaceful atmosphere” that currently characterizes bilateral ties.
Still, underlying tensions remain. The SCO’s diversity stretching from Central Asia to South Asia and the Middle East, brings with it a multitude of conflicting national interests. Despite growing diplomatic momentum, clear and unified outcomes from the summit remain uncertain.
Yet, analysts argue that the true value of this year’s SCO summit lies in its optics: a visual affirmation of China’s expanding diplomatic sphere and a signal that Beijing is increasingly capable of organizing global alternatives to Western-led forums. As Dylan Loh, a political science lecturer at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, put it, the event represents “a multilateral model designed by China, distinct from Western-dominated platforms”, a framework that is clearly gaining traction among non-Western powers.
Whether the summit yields substantive decisions or remains largely symbolic, it marks a notable shift in global power dynamics one that places China firmly at the center of an emerging new world order.
