- Rocket man - 30th September 2026
- Crime pays unfortunately, part two - 30th September 2026
- From Russia without love part three - 29th September 2026
During 43 years in journalism, for our Editor, Welshman Phil Parry, covering major events such as the highly-publicised summit between Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Donald Trump, has always been central, with all eyes now fixing on whether the American President will organise another one with the figure he dubbed ‘little rocket man’, North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.
To many onlookers the one we’ve just had wasn’t exactly a big success, but more could now follow!
Even in the one between Xi Jinping and Donald Trump if you go beyond the hype, and analyse the facts, hardly anything of substance was actually achieved.
T
here were no joint statements, and few major breakthroughs; both governments issued SEPARATE accounts of the meeting – perhaps a sign that despite the White House tours, and a promise of warmer ties, Washington and Beijing remain wary of each other.
It is rare for the leaders of the world’s two largest economies to meet so frequently.
But Beijing had hoped for a much longer extension to a truce over trade, making the two month reprieve they did secure, a modest gain rather than a major breakthrough.
China did get lower tariffs on $30 billion (£23 billion) of goods entering the United States of America (USA) with reciprocal reductions expected from Beijing.
Chinese products heading to American stores ranging from toys to small household appliances to Christmas decorations will benefit from the lower tariffs, and the Trump administration also said Beijing would buy at least 10 million metric tons of coal annually in 2027 and 2028.
In an unprecedented move, the pool covering all of this (which also includes NBC, ABC, CBS as well as Fox News), ceased recording and transmitting White House footage in solidarity with CNN, MS Now and Politico, which had been banned by Mr Trump over what he said was “their constant ‘reporting’ FAKE NEWS”.
This information was all over social media.
The decision meant that at the start, there was no high-quality pool footage of White House events and the President’s movements, though some smaller outlets attempted to provide coverage.
Even without them (at the beginning), the summit was less than perfect for news journalists because Mr Trump staged tightly choreographed photo opportunities, and was overheard by photographers praising the friendliness and deference of Chinese journalists in Mr Xi’s entourage.
American news organisations that had been banned from the White House for displeasing Mr Trump were suing the president even as the visit unfolded, as Mr Xi doubtless knew, though his poker face gave nothing away.
Tensions between the TV media and the administration reached a high (or LOW!) point, when journalists for CNN and MS Now were denied access to the White House state dinner in honour of Mr Xi. The journalists were blocked despite a ruling earlier in the day from a federal judge who granted a request by CNN, MS Now and Politico to force the White House to restore their access for the next two weeks while the case played out.
Although television networks remain apprehensive, a producer for CBS confirmed that the network would be serving as the TV pooler for the day as scheduled, according to a document obtained by The Guardian. “The plan is to return covering the President in a normal capacity with a full crew”, the document read.
Pamela Brown, a CNN anchor, told viewers: “CNN’s access to the White House has been restored, and the TV pool appears to be functioning as normal”.
The resumption ends (for now) an extraordinary standoff between the USA’s biggest media companies and the Trump administration, that led to an effective TV blackout of coverage of the President during the United Nations (UN) general assembly.
For decades, the five networks have shared the cost and responsibility of providing footage of the President that is carried by news outlets worldwide.
Pool subscribers had originally received a note from Fox News Washington bureau chief Bryan Boughton, who serves as the TV pool chair, saying that it would cease operations.
“This follows the White House’s position preventing CNN from fulfilling its assigned pool duties”, he wrote in a memo. “There will be no replacement pool put in place”.
So will all this be sorted out before the next summit with Mr Kim?
A summit with its leader, dictator Kim Jong Un will no doubt also be according to Mr Trump a ‘triumph’, because don’t forget he proclaimed that he had forged “a truly great friendship” with Mr Xi (another dubious figure).
Six American presidents have tried to deal with North Korea’s nuclear weapons programme, and six have failed.
Mr Trump, though, would like another shot, and has already said he expects to meet Mr Kim this year. A planned trip to Asia in November may provide an opportunity.
Both are due to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) conference, which is a regional economic forum founded in 1989 to promote free trade, investment, and sustainable growth across the Asia-Pacific region.
Mr Trump’s former chief envoy to North Korea said in a recent speech he may even propose meeting in Pyongyang, where no sitting American president has ever been.
Yet Mr Kim has made it clear that he will only meet if America drops its longstanding demands for “denuclearisation”, which is diplospeak for dismantling or removing his regime’s most potent weapons.
Just one month after Mr Trump curtailed long-planned military exercises with South Korea in the hopes of rekindling his bromance with Mr Kim, the North Korean dictator, flanked by his teenage daughter, oversaw the test of a new purportedly hypersonic missile.
The weapons would be an “incurable headache” for the country’s enemies, he crowed. It will certainly be a headache if nothing comes out of this summit, other than establishing a “truly great friendship”, as Mr Trump said about the last one with Mr Xi.
It’s this sort of thing that makes me incredibly angry, and trying to cover major events like these extremely hard..!
The memories of Phil’s decades-long award-winning career in journalism as he was gripped by the rare disabling condition Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia (HSP), have been released in a major book ‘A GOOD STORY’ (which covers other major events). Order it now!
Tomorrow – how for Phil monitoring trends has always been paramount – and today a key one is the rise of the right, as well as anti-immigration feeling.
This is shown in spades around the globe now, with the authorities in one state warning ‘foreign traders’, they had 90 days to ensure they hold correct status documentation (prompting a flood out of the country by the people concerned), in the face of a body of statistics revealing that migrants bring enormous economic and cultural BENEFITS,
