North Korea will loom large when top US and Chinese officials meet in Washington today for talks just two days after the death of Otto Warmbier, a US student who was detained in Pyongyang for 17 months.

The death, which US president Donald Trump called a “total disgrace”, will raise North Korea even higher on the agenda when Rex Tillerson, secretary of state, and James Mattis, defence secretary, host Yang Jiechi, China’s top foreign policy official, and General Fang Fenghui, chief of general staff of the People’s Liberation Army, in Washington.

The event marks the first high-level dialogue that Mr Trump and Chinese president Xi Jinping created at their summit in April in an effort to advance their common interests and to deal with their many differences, including finding ways to tackle the growing nuclear threat from North Korea.