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Why not ベジン or even 北京｛きたきょう｝?
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kanji etymology readings
Why does Japan still use ペキン for Beijing?
It came from a reading that existed in China. Note 北京大学 is Peking University.

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> [Wikipedia/北京市](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%8C%97%E4%BA%AC%E5%B8%82#%E5%8C%97%E4%BA%AC%E3%81%AE%E8%AA%AD%E3%81%BF%E6%96%B9)
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> 日本では一般的に「ペキン」と読む。この読みは中国南部の方言の唐音に由来する歴史的な読み方である[2]。1906年制定の郵政式アルファベット表記でもPekingと表記されている。

I believe ~~Peking~~ Pékin is used to call 北京 in French as well (like ペカン).
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Supplementing the existing answer. Short answer: **because there's neither /b/
nor /j/ in that word.** Nor do they even exist in modern standard Chinese to
begin with.

This may come as a surprise, but modern standard Chinese, aka Mandarin, lacks
most voiced consonants. So there's no /b/, /g/, /j/, or /d/. Although the
official romanization system for modern standard Chinese, aka pinyin,
prescribes these phonetic symbols, they are really realized as non-aspirated
voiceless consonants. But in Japanese—and English I may add, as well as most
European languages that I have knowledge of—voiced consonants are prevalent.

The way Beijing is actually pronounced is something close to / **peiching** /.

For more accurate and technical explanations, check out this Wiki page:
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Chinese_phonology>

Technically, the sound that the pinyin **j** represents is [t͡ɕ], the
voiceless alveolo-palatal sibilant affricate, and it's the same consonant as
/ch/ in ち.

The sound that the pinyin **b** represents is just a good ol unaspirated /p/,
as the /p/ in spy.

This is actually the reason why native Chinese speakers seem to have a hard
time telling apart か and が, ぱ and ば, た and だ, etc. See, for instance, this
Q&A:

[What's the pronunciation of か in
ですか?](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/49059/30454)
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It's ペキン because the actual official name for Bejing is Peking. For example,
in Beijing, there's a famous dish called Peking roast duck, not Beijing roast
duck. It's also caught on.
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