Gordon Brown got nowhere yesterday in trying to resolve the three worst disputes between Britain and Russia. But nor did the rows get worse in the first meeting with Dmitri Medvedev, Russia's new President, which is something, since relations are at their worst since the Cold War.

The British strategy, really a kind of wishful thinking, is that these conflicts can be kept to one side while the nations work harmoniously on other problems. That looks as fragile a plan as ever but, astonishingly, it is still intact. Brown came away with some scraps of comfort: that Russia would continue to be helpful on trying to nudge Iran down from its nuclear ambitions, and on Zimbabwe.

The bigger question is whether the G8 countries can use the forum to coax a suspicious Russia in from the cold. The reminders in the past few days of the problems Russia faces on every front except oil give them some bargaining power.

The more stagey the G8 summits become, the more heavily themed they are. When Bill Clinton invited his counterparts to Denver in 1997, he made them all wear cowboy dress. The theme of that summit, in essence, was American triumphalism: that having arrived at the end of history, the US had perfected the model of economic relations. The boasting, in official US documents, was so unashamed that it brought complaints from other delegations.

Since September 11, 2001, the mood of the gatherings has been darker. The costumes have gone and so has some intimacy, the sense that the value lay simply in the chance for the world's most powerful leaders to talk directly to each other.

Tony Blair's determination to make the 2005 Gleneagles summit about poverty hauled the agenda away from Iraq and terrorism, although the bombings on the London Tube during the gathering brought it back. Last year President Putin used the occasion to issue a warning that he might point Russia's missiles at Europe again.

That chill hangs over this summit too. In Britain's case, the prime cause is Russia's refusal to hand over Andrei Lugovoy, suspected of poisoning Alexander Litvinenko, a former agent turned Kremlin critic, in London in 2006. The other two fronts - the dispute between BP and its Russian shareholders, and Russia's irritation with the British Council - are unresolved. So, too, on a wider front, is Russia's fury at the US plan to site missile defence bases in Poland and the Czech Republic, although Poland's own unease has drawn some heat.

But if it were not for Europe's dependence on Russian energy, Russia's problems would eclipse its strengths. Yesterday a report about a Russian conscript soldier killing three others and then himself might be insignificant in itself, but reflects old, deep problems in Russia's Army. The murkiness of the BP row reflects Russia's indecision about whether it wants foreign help in developing its huge reserves, and if not, whether it will let its oligarchs fill the place.

The G8 is perhaps the only gathering where leaders can talk themselves down from positions of such suspicion. If only the staging does not compel them to talk about the grand themes of the future at the expense of the disputes of today.

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