2nd December 2025
In cybersecurity, there are no limits – only new voices ready to lead
Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs
A unique insight into UK foreign and development policy
14th October 2025
Lost and Found (but mostly lost)
13th October 2025
UK Special Envoy for Women and Girls: September visits to Sarajevo and New York
25th October 2016 Skopje, North Macedonia
Imagine a world without investigative journalism
I attended a conference on investigative journalism recently and had the chance to meet both journalists and those who support them. I took the opportunity to thank them for the difficult, and sometimes dangerous job they do. A job which is so important to the public interest and for which few journalists get the recognition […]
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24th October 2016 London, UK
UK universities are among the leading flag-bearers for Global Britain
It was obvious who was going to grab all the headlines. When Times Higher Education named the University of Oxford as the world’s number one university in September it was the first time the UK – indeed any institution outside the US – had taken the top spot in the World University Rankings since they […]
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24th October 2016 Mumbai, India
Industrial biotechnology mix: fermentation, fuels and festivals
In India it is believed every new activity should be planned on an auspicious day for future success. So when the UK Science and Innovation Network (SIN) organised a 3-day programme in Mumbai and Chennai for UK academics it fell (somewhat coincidentally) across Ganesh Chaturthi, Eid and Onam from 12-14 September 2016. Industrial biotechnology is […]
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24th October 2016 Singapore
Trending on Facebook – how the Prosperity Fund is helping to improve the business environment in Vietnam
We are half-way through the financial year and the South East Asia Prosperity Fund projects are now all in the delivery phase. To get up to speed on what is happening on the ground, British Embassy Hanoi has launched a social media campaign to share with us updates on this year’s Prosperity Fund projects. The […]
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21st October 2016 Vienna, Austria
Edmund de Waal: During the Night
A man awakes from a nightmare in the depths of the night. He writes down his fears and illustrates them with a painting. 500 years later, another artist is inspired by the painting to gather together a collection of historical objects, images and treasures from one of the finest collections in the world to “explore […]
21st October 2016 Kolkata, India
Another football
One of the surprises of Kolkata for me has been to discover how keen Kolkatans are on sport, and how many sports are played in and around the city. I knew that Kolkata is the home of one of the world’s great cricket grounds – Eden Gardens. As I expected, there is huge interest in […]
20th October 2016 Holy See
Can freedom of religion help counter violent extremism?
I am back in London this week with the Holy See’s Monsignor Antoine Camilleri for the Foreign Office’s conference on how freedom of religion and belief can help counter violent extremism. The discussion has been persuasive. I was particularly struck by the following points. US Ambassador Saperstein argued that you cannot have stability without religious […]
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19th October 2016 Vienna, Austria
What really happens at the IAEA General Conference: Kraftwerk explain
So what really happens at a General Conference of the IAEA – the International Atomic Energy Agency? Delegates from 168 countries converge on the HQ of the IAEA in Vienna. They hold many meetings; and, after a week, most of them return to their countries. But why? It’s always difficult explaining what diplomats do. It’s […]
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18th October 2016 Geneva, Switzerland
FCO Conference on Preventing Violent Extremism: How Freedom of Religion or Belief can help
Violent extremism is of course nothing new, but today we are confronted by the rapid growth of a particular form of it which is linked by its perpetrators to the tenets of one of the world’s great religions, Islam. It is worth just pausing for a moment to consider that violent extremism is not new, […]
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17th October 2016 London, UK
Hurricane Matthew: UK rapid response in Haiti
What happens when one of the smallest UK missions globally is preparing for a long delayed election and gets hit beforehand by a Force 4 hurricane? We found out last week. Preparing for elections which we hoped would deliver a stable government, we were pushed into full crisis mode with the approach of the strongest […]
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