BEIJING: Chinese President Xi Jinping returned to Beijing at midnight on Friday after wrapping up attendance at the 22nd meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and state visits to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. In a packed schedule of three days and two nights, President Xi flew to Nur-Sultan and Samarkand, stayed for 48 hours and attended nearly 30 events, featuring both multilateral and bilateral agendas and covering both security and development issues, said State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
Despite the tight schedule, there are many highlights and fruitful results, which have strongly pushed the SCO expansion forward and brought China’s relations with relevant countries to a new level. Wang said President Xi’s trip to Central Asia adds more vitality to the Silk Road spanning through Eurasia, brings more stabilizing factors to the international and regional situation standing at a crossroads, and creates more favorable international conditions for starting a new journey of building a modern socialist country in all respects.
President Xi said under the new circumstances, the SCO, as an important constructive force in international and regional affairs, should keep itself well-positioned in the face of changing international dynamics, ride the trend of the times, constantly enhance strategic independence, consolidate and deepen solidarity and cooperation, and build a closer SCO community with a shared future.
–The Daily Mail-CGTN news exchange item
