25th April 2024
Reflect & Remember: Anzac Day 2024
Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs
A unique insight into UK foreign and development policy
23rd April 2024
Good English – A Key to Panama’s Future Success
21st March 2024
Forests in focus on International Day of Forests
16th July 2019 Tokyo, Japan
Japan in East Anglia
As an Ambassador, I enjoy occasionally getting the chance to visit different regions of the UK, and find out more about their links with Japan. This week I was in East Anglia. I began in Cambridge, calling on Professor Mickey Adolphson, the Head of the Japanese Department in the University’s Faculty of Asian and Middle […]
15th July 2019 Dublin, Ireland
Media freedom and the protection of female journalists online
Welcome to the first edition of my blog. I intend to use it to share both reflections on important policy issues and some more personal impressions from my experiences here in Dublin and right across the beautiful country of Ireland. Today, however, I would like to focus on the incredibly important topic of media freedom. […]
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15th July 2019
Becoming UK High Commissioner to Cyprus for a day
While gender equality is improving in Cyprus, there is still more to do. Women in leadership positions in particular remain few. To promote gender equality and female leadership, the British High Commissioner in Cyprus Stephen Lillie welcomed a 17 year old young woman, Danae Xanthi, to shadow him for a day on 24 June to […]
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11th July 2019 London, UK
Diplomacy has never been more relevant. Here’s why
Last year was the deadliest year on record for journalists. UNESCO records suggest that at least 99 journalists were killed, 348 imprisoned and 60 held hostage. That is why, this week, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has jointly hosted with the Canadian government a major international conference in London, putting media freedom at the forefront […]
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8th July 2019 Geneva, Switzerland
We all benefit when developing countries trade more
Last week, the UK joined countries from around the world at the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) annual Aid for Trade Global Review, calling on our trading partners to help boost developing countries’ participation in the global trading system. Trade is a key driver of economic growth and can trigger positive changes in developing economies; helping […]
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8th July 2019 Geneva, Switzerland
Integrating Conventional Arms Control with Peace, Security and Development
Virtually all peace, security and development goals are severely hampered in contexts where arms and ammunition are not effectively regulated. It sounds like a statement of the obvious, but conventional arms control is not well integrated with thinking and actions on conflict prevention and management. I noticed this when I moved from New York, where […]
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5th July 2019
Improving visibility of female journalists
Ijeoma Onyeator has been a journalist for 17 years. She’s currently a senior anchor for the Channels Media Group in Nigeria, presenting live news and current affairs programmes. In this guest blog for the Foreign Office, she talks about female leadership in newsrooms and how she broke the glass ceiling. Doors of opportunity Being a […]
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2nd July 2019 Vienna, Austria
Where does the rain fall? London, Vienna… or Rome?
Very, very, occasionally, when it rains in Austria, an Austrian friend will say to me “Englisches Wetter, ha ha!” I smile politely. The UK is famously rainy, correct? We’ve all read Sherlock Holmes stories where it seems to be raining and foggy all the time. In “Asterix in Britain”, Asterix asks the Briton, Anticlimax, as […]
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1st July 2019 London,UK
Waxing Lyrical
Madame Tussauds is one of those attractions that Londoners tend to dismiss as aimed mostly at visitors to the city. And it is not the easiest of places to get in, as the successful navigation of a queue to buy a ticket earns you a place in another queue to enter the museum. But it […]
27th June 2019 Skopje, North Macedonia
First Skopje Pride parade and the 50th anniversary of Stonewall riots
Introduction by HM Ambassador Rachel Galloway, British Embassy Skopje: The strongest, safest and most prosperous societies are those in which all citizens can live freely without fear of violence or discrimination, and where all citizens, regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity, can play a full and active part in society. This Saturday Skopje will […]
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