China’s Challenge to Western Alliances

At the 25th anniversary session of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed an alternative model to Western alliances.Mr. Xi urged developing nations and the Global South to leverage “SCO wisdom” to argue for a more equitable and orderly multipolar world and reform of global governance institutions like the United Nations. The Secretary General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, and other guest delegations were in attendance for this anniversary session of the SCO.The 26th meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the SCO convened on September 1, 2026, in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. Leaders from the 10 member states (China, Russia, India, Pakistan, Iran, and Belarus and the four Central Asian nations) signed the Bishkek Declaration and 13 other documents dealing with security, technology and anti-drug cooperation.Mr. Xi committed China to provide localized technical projects, collaboration on Artificial Intelligence with SCO member countries and alignment through the Belt and Road initiative (BRI), a massive global and economic strategy proposed by Mr. Xi in 2013. (The BRI, with 146 member states, seeks to link Asia, Europe, Africa, and La...