Xi's speech was attended by Australia's Trade Minister Simon Birmingham, who was scheduled to join a World Trade Organisation ministers meeting later in the day.

The Chinese president warned that stifling the flow of information and talent could widen the world’s technological divide. He said the world was on the threshold of major breakthroughs in a “new round of scientific and technological revolution”.

Xi urged countries to support businesses “to independently carry out technology exchanges and cooperation so that the source of innovation can fully flow”.

In the US, Chinese technology workers and academics have also been refused visas as Washington, which views China as a technological rival, cracks down on suspected cases of intellectual property theft.

“We should jointly strengthen the protection of intellectual property rights, rather than engage in knowledge blockades, create and even expand the technological divide,” Xi said.

Minutes later, French president Emmanuel Macron responded with a speech of his own where he said the protection national sovereignty was a key issue in technology cooperation.

“Avoiding damage to national sovereignty” was an important consideration of European countries’ negotiations with China over technology and science cooperation, he said.

Macron emphasised that breakthroughs in science and technology were also dependent on the protection of intellectual property.

He said China was a cooperation partner for Europe but also a competitor, and there was a need to speed up the process for foreign companies entering the Chinese market.

Schmidt’s panel on AI has released its first report which found China was investing more in AI than the US. It found China was ahead in face recognition and financial technology, but the best research on AI was occurring in the West.

The report said the US should be open to cooperating with China because US research on AI was dependent on Chinese researchers.

Sixty-three countries sent trade delegations to the China International Import Expo in Shanghai, now in its second year. The event was designed by Xi to demonstrate that China was seeking to increase the import of foreign goods.

Xi said China’s middle class was the biggest in the world and offered unlimited potential for foreign companies.

He said China supported World Trade Organisation reform so that the WTO “can be more authoritative and effective”.

China hopes the 15-nation Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, negotiated between ASEAN nations and their partner-countries in Bangkok on Monday, would be signed and come into early effect, he added.