17th July 2025
Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow
Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs
A unique insight into UK foreign and development policy
15th July 2025
International Day of Women in Diplomacy: UK Special Envoy for Women and Girls visit to Geneva
1st May 2025
The UN Commission on the Status of Women: My first visit as UK Special Envoy for Women and Girls
19th February 2015
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
#freedomtobelieve
Most of the world’s population lives in countries where freedom of religion or belief is restricted in some way, and over a third where such limitations are extreme. Some 60 countries retain on their statute books laws against blasphemy, or apostasy, with often draconian punishments for those who transgress. And yet, as long ago as […]
19th February 2015 Colombo, Sri Lanka
A visit to the Vanni
Earlier this week, the UN Human Rights Council agreed to Prince Zeid’s request to defer consideration of his office’s investigation into the end of the conflict in Sri Lanka to the summer. The UK was a main sponsor of the resolution setting up the investigation and we remain committed to it. Those who provided information to […]
18th February 2015 Madrid, Spain
About British Scientists in Spain
I’ve blogged before about Science and Diplomacy. For the UK, science is a real force for generating economic growth, fostering collaboration between international partners and improving living standards everywhere. That’s why we have a network of Science and Innovation officers working in our embassies around the world, including here in Madrid: Spain is an important […]
18th February 2015 Beirut, Lebanon
New Technology for Old Challenges: Innovation and Development
The Syria conflict has created the biggest refugee crisis in modern history – imagine everyone inside the M25 leaving Britain. Lebanon is dealing with an unprecedented influx of those vulnerable refugees, 78% of them women and children. The international community’s response has been huge – we are spending more in Lebanon per square kilometre than […]
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18th February 2015
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Breaking Up Is Hard To Do
Dear Jordan, Our love affair has lasted for four years. But I’m afraid it’s time to break up. I have to leave. It’s going to be hard to do. As Juliet said to Romeo: “parting is such sweet sorrow”. We will be really sad, but it’s time to move on. Of course I knew from […]
18th February 2015
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Business in Turkey: the rules of the game
British people are often accused of using too many sporting metaphors. Expression such as “a good innings” (doing well but nearly finished) or “a sticky wicket” (a hard-to-defend situation) come from cricket. Others, eg “game, set and match” (the contest has ended) or “ the ball’s in your court” (it’s up to you to make […]
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17th February 2015 Montreal, Canada
Global Young Leaders in Dementia: Japanese Event
Again I am not taking credits for this blog. SIN Canada organised the 1st youth event on the 10th September (immediately before the Global Action Against Dementia Legacy Event- GAADLE) to discuss Dementia at the British High Commission. We facilitated the attendance of two Canadian young leaders (Laura Booi and Felicia White) to the Japanese […]
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16th February 2015 London, UK
Consular appointments – the challenges and lessons learnt
Lessons in configuring a service, running pilots and handling diversity in skills As we’ve developed our new consular appointment booking service we’ve encountered several challenges along the way, not least getting into the embassy in Madrid, and learnt many lessons which we can apply to future transformation work on legalisation and emergency travel documents. Parents […]
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16th February 2015 Sana’a, Yemen
Yemen: the ball is in the Houthis’ court
On 11 February, the UK took the decision on security grounds to temporarily suspend operations at the British Embassy in Sana’a and withdraw diplomatic staff. I would like to explain why. The UK wants to see success in Yemen. We have our national counter-terrorism objectives against Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. But we have […]
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13th February 2015 Toronto, Canada
DementiaHack 2014: Video recap
DementiaHack, the world’s first dementia-themed hackathon, took place in September 2014 in partnership with HackerNest. If you don’t have four hours to watch the raw video from the event then here are two- and ten-minute recaps: Look out for a guest post from hackathon winners CareUmbrella in the next few weeks. We also hope to […]