Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office Blogs

A unique insight into UK foreign and development policy

14th May 2013 London, UK

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by David Lidington

Minister for Europe, London

A startling statistic

A startling statistic – over half the businesses that get help from UK Trade & Investment go on to win additional sales of over £600,000 within two years. The UK’s trade performance is often discussed in the abstract, or at the macroeconomic level. People look at the effect on UK GDP or the balance of […]

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13th May 2013 Ottawa, Canada

Data: the Raw Material of the 21st Century

In today’s ‘Information Age’,  data is the fuel driving innovation in economy and society. Chris Yiu, head of the Digital Government Unit at the Policy Exchange (a leading London think tank) sits on the UK Government’s Data Strategy Board. He was recently in Ottawa to speak at the Data Effect conference about UK initiatives. I […]

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13th May 2013 Harare, Zimbabwe

Catriona Laing

by Catriona Laing

British Ambassador to Zimbabwe

Prime Minister of Denmark visits Helmand PRT

The Prime Minister of Denmark, Helle Thorning-Schmidt has visited Helmand Provincial Reconstruction Team in Lashkar Gah for an update on progress. The visit was the premier’s second since she took office in 2011. The Prime Minister expressed her gratitude and pride of the Danish military and civilian staff in Helmand. She stressed that Denmark will […]

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13th May 2013 London, UK

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by David Lidington

Minister for Europe, London

Europe – the big debate

I was in Dublin last week for Europe Day, where I gave a speech about the future of Europe. There is always a certain frisson when a European audience invites a British minister to speak. The late Baroness Thatcher said once that if you believed everything you read about our views on Europe, it would […]

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12th May 2013 Harare, Zimbabwe

Catriona Laing

by Catriona Laing

British Ambassador to Zimbabwe

Helmand – will it spiral back into violent extremism?

I’m back from Helmand for a couple of weeks for some R&R, to attend the FCO leadership conference, and to do a ground-truthing session at NATO in Brussels. As always, I’m spending plenty of time persuading friends, colleagues, and anyone who will listen, that: no, it isn’t all going fall to pieces after 2014. Progress […]

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10th May 2013 Tashkent, Uzbekistan

Memorial Day

Our Defence Attaché and I spent Thursday morning laying wreaths at two sites in Tashkent – the Sorrowful Mother monument in Independence Square, and the Volgograd Memorial Cemetery – along with other Ambassadors and military attachés, to mark what in the Soviet Union was known as Victory Day and in Uzbekistan is now the Day […]

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10th May 2013 London, UK

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by Alison Daniels

Digital Transformation Leader at UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office

Come and work in the FCO Press & Digital team

We’ve just advertised four jobs in the FCO digital team in London. They are: Social Media Manager Digital Communications Manager x 2 Senior Digital Editor If you’re interested in how digital can deliver foreign policy objectives, have a passion for social media, want to develop and design innovative digital campaigns, be part of the team […]

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