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Leigh Turner

Ambassador to Austria and UK Permanent Representative to the United Nations and other International Organisations in Vienna

Part of UK in Ukraine

19th April 2012

London Olympics: 100 Days to Go

The athletes crouch down. The signal is given and, muscles straining, they cover the run in a few seconds. There are 100 of them, aged 10-12. All around, teachers and students roar their support.

Welcome to the “EkoNad” school, on the Left Bank of the Dnepr river in Kyiv, for a dramatic celebration marking “100 Days To Go” to the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympics Games. It’s terrific to see so much enthusiasm crammed into a school sports ground.

100 days to go to the Olympics observance in Kyiv

In Kyiv, preparations for London 2012 are running at top speed. At the Olympic and Paralympics training camps, Ukrainian athletes are preparing for potential sporting glory. In the embassy’s visa section, we are working closely with the Ukrainian authorities to issue visas and take biometrics from those athletes and accompanying officials travelling to London for the games (known as “Olympic family members”). So far we have issued 187 visas to Olympic and Paralympics family members, and have taken 743 sets of biometric data, including 115 from the Ukrainian National Paralympics Team. That’s out of a total of around 750-900 people. To help make this possible, members of the visa section have travelled to the headquarters of the Ukrainian National Olympics Committee and National Paralympics Committee, and have travelled to an NPC training camp in the south of Ukraine.

Back at the EkoNad school, I meet the young athletes and hand out prizes, accompanied by top Ukrainian Olympic medallists in areas as diverse as sailing and handball. How exciting will the London Olympics be? Judging from the young sportspeople here in Kyiv, very exciting indeed.

>> More photos from the event

About Leigh Turner

I hope you find this blog interesting and, where appropriate, entertaining. My role in Vienna covers the relationship between Austria and the UK as well as the diverse work of…

I hope you find this blog interesting and, where appropriate, entertaining. My role in Vienna covers the relationship between Austria and the UK as well as the diverse work of the UN and other organisations; stories here will reflect that.

About me: I arrived in Vienna in August 2016 for my second posting in this wonderful city, having first served here in the mid-1980s. My previous job was as HM Consul-General and Director-General for Trade and Investment for Turkey, Central Asia and South Caucasus based in Istanbul.

Further back: I grew up in Nigeria, Exeter, Lesotho, Swaziland and Manchester before attending Cambridge University 1976-79. I worked in several government departments before joining the Foreign Office in 1983.

Keen to go to Africa and South America, I’ve had postings in Vienna (twice), Moscow, Bonn, Berlin, Kyiv and Istanbul, plus jobs in London ranging from the EU Budget to the British Overseas Territories.

2002-6 I was lucky enough to spend four years in Berlin running the house, looking after the children (born 1992 and 1994) and doing some writing and journalism.

To return to Vienna as ambassador is a privilege and a pleasure. I hope this blog reflects that.

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100 days kyiv London 2012 olympics Sport

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