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China’s Xi Jinping skips mask-free SCO dinner amid packed talks schedule
- Xi meets a dozen leaders in Central Asia on first trip abroad in nearly 1,000 days
- Covid-19 policy cited as reason the Chinese president did not go to a banquet
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Chinese President Xi Jinping made the most of his first trip abroad since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, meeting 12 leaders in three days, but he nevertheless avoided a mask-free group dinner.
After nearly 1,000 days within China’s borders, Xi had a series of meetings to shore up alliances on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in the Uzbek city of Samarkand on Friday.
He held talks with Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan, Ebrahim Raisi of Iran, Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Türkiye, Shehbaz Sharif of Pakistan, as well as joint discussions with Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh of Mongolia and Vladimir Putin of Russia.
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The talks with Putin were the second in two days, as were those with Khürelsükh.
01:54
Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin speak in person for first time since Russia invaded Ukraine
Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin speak in person for first time since Russia invaded Ukraine
He also met Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, Tajik President Emomali Rahmon, Turkmen President Serdar Berdimuhamedow, and Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov on Thursday.
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