Peter Ricketts
Ambassador to France from February 2012 to January 2016.
22nd May 2014
Paris, France
For far too long, rape and sexual violence has been used as a weapon of war, particularly against women. It makes conflict worse, it prolongs the effects of conflict, and it makes reconciliation far more difficult. Two years ago my Foreign Secretary William Hague, working with Angelina Jolie, who is the UN Special Envoy on these […]
Read more on Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict – the view from Paris | Reply
5th May 2014
Paris, France
On May 6th we are organising an event here in the Embassy on the theme of applying innovation and excellence to raise achievement. We’re calling it ‘Aiming Higher’ and our star guest will be Sir Dave Brailsford
Read more on Aiming Higher: lessons from Tour de France Success | Reply
30th April 2014
Paris, France
This week I reflected for a French-speaking audience on the strong British economic recovery. The Chancellor, George Osborne, gave an interview to the French newspaper Les Echos on this subject, which was published today. Next Monday, I’ll be previewing a talk we’re organising here with Sir David Brailsford, head of Team Sky. Feel free to […]
Read more on The UK Economic Recovery | Reply
7th April 2014
Paris, France
We recently held here a conference on the issue of defence cooperation between Britain and France, organised by the Franco-British Council. This is a non-governmental organisation that has just celebrated 40 years of working to bring thinkers together between France and the UK; and they now have an annual conference on defence once in France […]
Read more on Defence Cooperation and the Franco-British Council | Reply
31st March 2014
Paris, France
We’ve just had the publication of a major report by the intergovernmental panel on climate change (IPCC) – the UN authorised panel that is the most authoritative source of scientific advice – dealing with the impact of climate change on human beings and our environment.
Read more on Climate change is already happening | Reply
25th March 2014
Paris, France
In the last few days we’ve had two events here in the residence on the theme of the digital revolution and how it’s changing our lives. First of all we had an event to celebrate innovation and technology and young talent applying itself to the problems we are facing.
Read more on Digital revolution at the Residence | Reply
10th March 2014
Paris, France
I’ve talked before about the events in Kiev, at a time when they reminded me of the fall of the Berlin wall, and the extraordinary surge of freedom and independence that happened after that in Eastern Europe. Since then, things have got more difficult, because we’ve had what is obviously an intervention of Russian armed […]
Read more on Bringing Russia and Ukraine to the negotiating table | Reply
24th February 2014
Paris, France
The events in Ukraine over last week have been absolutely extraordinary, and they’ve made me think back to that period in 1989 with the fall of the Berlin wall, and the liberation of the countries in Central and Eastern Europe.
Read more on Extraordinary events in Ukraine | Reply (2)
11th February 2014
Paris, France
We are now in the Bicentenary year for the Residence – 200 years ago, the Duke of Wellington bought this house from Pauline, the sister of Napoléon. To celebrate that, we are running a series of events through the year, highlighting both the past and the future of UK-French relations.
Read more on Celebrating London and Paris, past and future | Reply
30th January 2014
Paris, France
This week we are holding the next in a series of summits between Britain and France, with President Hollande travelling to the UK. The summit is being held on an airbase in the south of England to emphasise the importance of the defence and security work that we do together.
Read more on The UK-France Summit 2014 | Reply (1)