Vladimir Putin’s ambiguous overtures to the US on missile defence at this week’s G8 summit sent foreign policy experts scratching their heads around the world. But when Angela Merkel, the German host, closed the event on Friday, she was not going to let the Russian president steal the show.

The summit, she said, was “a success”, and although a look back at the three-day gathering shows this to be only partly true, the German chancellor no doubt comes out of it honourably.