3rd December 2024
RENEWING OLD TIES: THE NEW BISHOP OF LONDON
Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs
A unique insight into UK foreign and development policy
25th November 2024
The climate crisis and gender-based violence
8th November 2024
Ecolabels: A Catalyst for Sustainable Food Choices?
4th September 2014 Singapore
Introducing the SE Asia Prosperity Fund Programme
Welcome to a blog about the South East Asia Prosperity Fund Programme. Since joining the programme in 2012, I’ve quickly come to realise how tricky it is to explain what the Prosperity Fund does. Explaining it to a Singapore audience makes it doubly hard. Why? That’s because I’m up against this guy in terms of mind-share… God of […]
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4th September 2014 Yerevan, Armenia
Building Stability in an Unpredictable World – the NATO Summit in Wales 4-5 September
Following the terrible events of the last few months – in Ukraine, Libya, Iraq, Syria, Gaza, and ebola in West Africa – describing our world as ‘unpredictable’ no longer seems adequate. It feels like some of our most basic assumptions – about civilized nations’ best interests, a Europe finally at peace, and the nature of […]
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3rd September 2014
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Observando el uso del dinero de los contribuyentes británicos en acción
En el día Mundial de la Asistencia Humanitaria, tuve el honor de recibir el premio como Embajadora Humanitaria, en representación de todas las personas del Reino Unido que contribuyen con el presupuesto del Gobierno Británico para el desarrollo en el exterior. En 2013 por primera vez el Reino Unido cumplió su objetivo de contribuir con […]
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3rd September 2014
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Seeing aid money from UK taxpayers in action
On world humanitarian assistance day I had the good fortune to pick up an award as a humanitarian ambassador on behalf of all the people of the UK who contribute to the British government’s overseas development budget. In 2013, the UK met the target of contributing 0.7% of its national income in aid for the […]
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3rd September 2014 Skopje, North Macedonia
Croeso i Gymru! Croesawu i’r DU!
There’s a moment of truth coming for the team organising the NATO summit in Wales. They will discover in the next couple of days whether the plans they have worked on for months now will fall into place. This is a complex dance. Delegations from over 60 countries and organisations, plus about 1500 media representatives, […]
3rd September 2014
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Responding to ISIL
There has, rightly, been enormous concern expressed across the world about the recent turn of events in Northern Iraq. The expulsion of the Christian communities from Mosul and the 13 villages of the Plain of Nineveh – an historic heartland inhabited by Christians from the earliest days, well known from, amongst other sources, the story […]
3rd September 2014 Toronto, Canada
Canadian science news: 25-31 August 2014
Trouble reading this story or moving through pages? Check it out on Storify here: https://storify.com/SINCanada/canadian-science-news-25-31-august-2014 [View the story ” Canadian science news: 25-31 August 2014″ on Storify]
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3rd September 2014 Beirut, Lebanon
Wisdom Amid Adversity?: NATO Comes to Wales
With a formidable to-do list for the world’s leaders, the 2014 NATO Summit takes place in Wales on 4/5 September. This will be the largest ever gathering of international leaders in Britain. In preparation, some diplomats have even been learning Welsh (Matthew Barzun clip). Having been to a few, I’ve sometimes been sceptical about the […]
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3rd September 2014 London, UK
Nato summit comes at a pivotal moment
This month marks the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War. That appalling conflict – often still known as the Great War – devastated a generation. My mother’s father, born in 1899, was one of nine grandsons of his mother’s father. Of those nine, six fell in that war. My grandfather himself, aged […]
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3rd September 2014 Sofia, Bulgaria
How We Brought a Subject Into the Open
by Richard Thomas Richard Thomas was British Ambassador to Bulgaria from 1989 to 1994. “We were not sanctimonious, and we did our best to build on the goodwill and good practices that already existed. I have the happiest memories of days out at Vidrare […] seeing the children’s faces light up and sharing in the staffs’ […]
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