Pomp over progress as Trump rolls out red carpet for China’s president Xi Jinping

While the US president hailed the visit as ‘great’, almost nothing of substance was achieved, which was a win for Xi

• Key takeaways from the Trump-Xi summit in Washington

If the Beijing meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping in May was the “stalemate summit”, the second round of talks between the presidents of the US and China this week seemed to give up entirely on the idea of breakthroughs.

Instead, it was dubbed a celebration of “diplotainment” rather than diplomacy, where pomp prevailed over progress, and where one of the main outcomes was the news that two giant pandas would soon be sent from China to the Atlanta Zoo.