ON MARCH 28th a sandstorm descended on Beijing like a chemical-weap-ons attack, sending pollution-monitoring equipment off the charts and reducing visibility to a few metres. The same day the Chinese government announced that Kim Jong Un, North Korea’s leader, had met his Chinese opposite number, Xi Jinping, in Beijing, sending diplomatic speculation off the charts and leaving the prospects for talks about North Korea’s nuclear weapons as hard to discern as ever.
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