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Prime minister makes progress on US-EU trade deal, but Syria will be the real test of his mettle
In the elaborate, etiquette-riddled role of world summit host, two things matter: first, that you can put on a good show for your fellow leaders, projecting something unique about your country's culture; and second, that you can demonstrate that you have a coherent and distinctive political agenda. The G8 as an institution, after all, is an anachronism – a body without legitimacy or power, in the words of David Miliband last week.
So David Cameron's choice of the remote Lough Erne golf course in Northern Ireland to host the G8 seemed an unfortunate one. The resort hotel is extravagant, debt-ridden and in administration – arguably an accurate symbol of the British economy.
Such is the pared-down No 10 operation these days that members of Cameron's staff were up all night fixing last-minute hitches, such as transport for the leaders. Panic broke out when it seemed that low cloud would delay the helicopters taking world leaders from Belfast International to the site of the summit.
Yet in the end, David Cameron's first day hosting the summit can be counted a success, even if the final judgment will rest on what is agreed overnight.
The visuals certainly worked well in the morning, when Barack Obama in Belfast addressed young students about the chic island of Ireland, urging them to recognise that peace is harder than war.
An Obama-Cameron visit to an Enniskillen integrated primary school, of which the highlight was a mural painting competition, proved a rather prouder moment for Britain than the Obama-Cameron table tennis match in 2011, in which the prime minister seemed unable to hit a ball.
By mid-afternoon, as Cameron strode down a long pathway to greet his guests individually at the vast lakeside resort, the leaders were in their shirt sleeves, if not in actual sunlight. As they entered the hotel, Cameron had arranged for them to be boxed around an intimate 6ft wooden table large enough to accommodate the ever present representatives from the European Union, José Manuel Barroso and Herman Van Rompuy.
Like every G8 summit host, Cameron had begun preparing his agenda as long as a year ago – trade, tax and transparency. But he had feared as recently as Friday that one of his precious Ts was about to collapse. He was concerned that he would be unable to announce the launch of the EU-US trade talks at the summit's outset, saying in a weekend interview with the Guardian that there was no point in imposing artificial deadlines.
The French had been holding out to protect their film and cultural interests from the invasion of homogenised Hollywood – but in the end, a deal was struck, and at the launch of the summit, Cameron, Obama and the EU agreed that talks on a transatlantic trade and investment deal would begin in Washington next month.
A somewhat tougher task for Cameron was due to come at the intimate evening dinner for the 10 leaders, when Cameron was to explore whether there was any basis for a peace conference on Syria. It was a last chance to see if there was a peaceful way to end what William Hague described as "the worst humanitarian disaster of the 21st century".
The prime minister's main aim was to find out if Russia could agree with the rest of the G8 on the terms of a peace deal. Based on his conversations with Obama and the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, Cameron was trying to prise from his guests whether they collectively agreed on extra humanitarian aid to Syria, going after the extremists inside the country, the "red line" of chemical weapons, and, finally, the most divisive issue of all – who would agree to the transition to a new government with executive powers, code for the removal of Assad as president.
In making this the basis of the conversation, Cameron was deliberately setting to one side the contentious issue of sending arms to the rebels. However, if there was no agreement by the time the Bushmills was served, and the evening fire was starting to cool, the thinking was that Putin would be left isolated. The military option would return to the forefront.
If that is not enough for the G8 to digest, Cameron will open his third and final front today over lunch on Tuesday on giving political backing to a long-term push on a new international corporate tax regime. Much of this work will ultimately be passed to the OECD and to the Russian-chaired G20 summit in St Petersburg in September.
But at this summit Cameron is being pressed by the aid agencies to make a last effort to persuade his fellow G8 leaders to back the idea of public registers of beneficial ownership of companies. So far, Cameron has only committed the UK to a register of beneficial ownership available to UK tax authorities. It is a technical issue, but for the aid agencies, it is vital that the register of true owners is made public.
In a last appeal to the G8, Kofi Annan, the former UN secretary general and chair of the Africa Progress Panel, issued a call for action, saying the G8 must establish registries on the ownership of companies and trusts in all tax jurisdictions, and that the registries need to be publicly available. He said: "The impact for G8 governments is a loss of revenue, but in Africa, it has direct impact on the lives of mothers and children."
By Tuesday evening, the judgment will be made on Cameron's international statesmanship. The assessment overnight is that he is still in there with a fighting chance to secure the agreements he seeks – but it is going to be an extraordinary test of his still relatively unknown diplomatic skills.
The G8 menu
As tweeted by David Cameron
Kilkeel Crab, Prawn and Avocado
Roast fillet and braised shin of Kettyle beef, violet artichokes, Comber new potatoes plus seasonal vegetables
Apple crumble, with Bushmills whiskey custard and a selection of cheeses from the British Isles.