Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs

A unique insight into UK foreign and development policy

9th December 2025

Skopje, North Macedonia

Why We Need Data, Courage, and Community

by Tanja Ivanova

Chevening Scholar and President of NGO Reactor

2nd December 2025

Skopje, North Macedonia

In cybersecurity, there are no limits – only new voices ready to lead

by Martina Ackovska

Chevening Cybersecurity Fellow

14th October 2025

Geneva, Switzerland

Lost and Found (but mostly lost)

by Bob Last

Head, UK Mission Political and Human Rights Team

15th August 2013 Singapore

by Tom Crawley

Southeast Asia Science and Innovation Team

Smarter, Faster – Life Lessons from F1

One of the things which make this job so enjoyable is getting to bring really inspiring people to the region to talk about great UK innovation. This week we’ve hosted Mike Gascoyne, long-time Formula One technical director, and current CTO of the Caterham Group, who generously agreed to visit Singapore and Malaysia to talk about […]

14th August 2013 Windhoek, Namibia

by Marianne Young

High Commissioner, Windhoek

An Anglo-German labour of love, devotion and educational excellence in northern Namibia

I have just spent the most fascinating evening with a remarkable Anglo-German family in Kunene Province, north western Namibia, en route to the far north to see the effect of this year’s drought emergency. Gillian and Reiner Stommel are based five hours drive north of Windhoek where they run Otjikondo School, which they founded in […]

14th August 2013

by Nigel Baker

Ambassador to the Holy See (2011-2016)

This post was published when the author was in a previous role

The Wisdom of Father Brown

The following is a guest blog by Steve Townsend, Deputy Head of Mission. It was announced this week that the Bishop of Northampton has started the investigation whether there is a case for canonisation for G K Chesterton. This prompted me to go back to his best-loved creation, and one of my favourite fictional characters, […]

13th August 2013 Havana, Cuba

by Tim Cole

Former British Ambassador to Cuba

From Honiara to Havana for health reasons

I met the Ambassador of the Solomon Islands a few weeks ago. The Solomons (Honiara is the capital) are in the Pacific Ocean over 13,000 km from Cuba and they only have a few embassies around the world so you might wonder why they have recently opened one in Havana. The Ambassador, Simeon Bouro, explained to […]

13th August 2013 Chicago, USA

by Jack Westwood

The Pi’s the limit – a computer for everyone!

The following is a guest post by Sophia Wootton, summer intern at the British Consulate General in Chicago. Sophia is a recent graduate of the University of Birmingham. In only my second week as an intern for the British Consulate General in Chicago, I have been lucky enough to meet British software engineer, Rob Bishop, […]

13th August 2013 Chevening, UK

by Chevening Conversations

A Botswana Chevening Scholar Visits The Mother of Parliaments

Our latest blog entry is by Bogolo Joy Kenewendo, a 2012 Chevening Scholar from Botswana. Bogolo is studying for an MsC in International Economics at the University of Sussex. If you are a Chevening scholar and are interested in submitting a blog entry for the Chevening Conversations blog, then please email us at fcoscholarships@fco.gov.uk. This is a story of […]

12th August 2013

by Paul Madden

British Ambassador to Japan

This post was published when the author was in a previous role

UK economy returns to sustainable growth

That was the principal message of Permanent Secretary at the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills, Martin Donnelly, when he visited Australia last week. He said that the UK’s GDP growth was expected to reach around 1% this year and perhaps 2% next year. Australian economists and business people he met shared this positive assessment. […]

12th August 2013

by Sarah Dickson

Ambassador to Guatemala (June 2012 - June 2015)

This post was published when the author was in a previous role

Working Together

The International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples was celebrated on 9 August, and to mark it we have a guest blog from Thomas Hart, Country Director of Health Unlimited, an organisation that this Embassy is supporting with a project in Guatemala’s second city, Quetzaltenango. Over to you Thomas… I was recently asked in a […]