The trip is Xi’s third abroad this year and his sixth to Kazakhstan in the decade or so since he became president, making it Xi’s second most visited country after Russia.
He is accompanied on the trip by top aide Cai Qi and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, and was greeted on arrival in Astana on Monday by Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, with the two leaders holding in the afternoon.
In addition to Xi and Tokayev, leaders from Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan will be in Astana for the summit, two years after the Chinese city of Xian hosted the first gathering.
This week’s summit comes as leaders of the Group of 7 gather half a world away in Canada to confront a global economy battered by uncertainty and conflict.
Sun Weidong, head of the China-Central Asia Mechanism which organises the regional summit, said Beijing’s aims were to deepen political trust between the partners, stabilise global industrial and supply chains, and foster an open and stable trade environment.
